Red Sorghum

In China in the thirties a young woman is carried off in a red sedan chair to be married to a leprous distillery owner. The man dies soon after and she takes over the distillery, which makes sorghum liquor; the workers accept her and they work together for years. Then the Japanese army arrives. Zhang Yimou adapted Mo Yan's novel for his first film and used colour as his principal means of telling, with red running the same line from the sedan chair through the liquor to blood. Gong Li is in her first major role. The scenes in the field and the distillery are staged almost as ceremony. It won the Golden Bear in Berlin and counted as the turning point in international attention to Chinese cinema. Who it is for: viewers who like the fifth generation of Chinese cinema and strong use of colour. Who it is not for: anyone who would rather not meet the harsh violence of the last section unprepared.