On its cinema release, the film is well-known with title “The Banquet” or “The Night Banquet” if loosely translated from its Chinese title “Ye Yan”. This Chinese wuxia drama film will release on region 1 DVD
by Dragon Dynasty which had re-titled it to “Legend of the Black Scorpion”, why they have decided to rename the movie on its DVD release might be will eludes us a little but this stunningly stylist film which story is loosely adapted from William Shakespeare’s popular story “Hamlet” is still very worth to complete our home cinema collection while it has all of those strikingly beautiful cinematography, sumptuous set, costumes and stunningly choreographed fight scenes that will give a lot of pleasure to our eyes. A retelling of Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” set in 907AD, during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period following the fall of the Tang Dynasty, directed by mainland director Feng Xiao Gang who raised his name with Hong Kong action drama “A World Without Thieves”. “Black Scorpion” is one of the biggest budgeted Chinese films ever made as with “The Warlords” or “Curse of the Golden Flowers.”
Below is the film synopsis from Wikipedia that had compared it with the Hamlet’s plot and characterizations:
The Crown Prince Wu Luan was four years older than "Little Wan" (later Empress Wan) and they both felt for each other when his father, Emperor, decided to marry "Little Wan" and she became Empress Wan. Wu Luan, deeply hurt by this, fled to the South to rejoice in music and dance. Emperor Li (Shakespeare's Claudius) then murdered his brother and upon acceding the throne, and taken his brother's young wife, Empress Wan (younger version of Shakespeare's Gertrude), who he previously molested, as his wife and has her recrowned as Empress. The usurping emperor then sents out riders to assassinate his nephew, Crown Prince Wu Luan (Shakespeare's Hamlet), who would succeed the throne before any of his uncle's progeny. The crown prince, away at a retreat for masked mime actors, survives the massacre at the monastery and is eventually spirited back to the palace. To keep him alive, Empress Wan has made a compromise with his uncle, which angers Prince Wu Luan. His relationship with his stepmother is unusual because they grew up together in the court, are about the same age and she has romantic feelings for him. However, the prince is engaged to marry Qing Nu (Shakespeare's Ophelia), the daughter of a palace official, the Grand Marshal (who can be linked to Shakespeare's Polonius). A close ally of the former emperor, the Grand Marshall's power is weakened when his son (Shakespeare's Laertes), who is very protective of his sister, Qing Nu, is sent to a distant province to become governor. Meanwhile, the Empress Wan is to have a new coronation ceremony. As a special treat, Prince Wu Luan, an accomplished singer and dancer, stages a masked mime play that exposes his uncle as his father's murderer. Rather than kill the prince and risk alienating Empress Wan, the emperor decides the prince would be traded as a hostage for the prince of a neighboring kingdom, the Khitans, although it is known that the neighbor prince is an imposter. An ambush by the emperor's men is set up in a far away, snowy land, but the Grand Marshal's son saves the prince.
Believing that power is firmly in his grip, the emperor calls for a grand banquet. Qing Nu, the Grand Marshal's daughter, has planned another play for the occasion, and in tribute to her fiance, she wears his theater mask. Empress Wan has her own plans – to poison the emperor. However, the scheme to poison the emperor fails as the cup he was to drink out of is instead given to Qing Nu out of respect and partly of pity for her. Upon the young woman's death, the emperor realises in horror that the empress Wan had plotted his death. It is then revealed that Crown Prince Wu Luan was in fact a member of the masked performing troupe. The emperor then commits suicide by drinking the rest of the poisoned wine intended for him. As Empress Wan asks Wu Luan to kill her, the Grand Marshal's son attempts to kill the Empress to avenge his sister, but his poisoned blade is stopped by Prince Wu Luan and Empress Wan stabs the Grand Marshal's son. However, Prince Wu Luan fatally poisons himself in the process of stopping the Grand Marshal's son. In the end sequence, Empress Wan grasps bright red cloth ands speaks of the "flames of desire" that she has satiated by taking the throne. She is suddenly pierced by a blade from an unknown source. As she is dying, she turns around and looks at her killer with a horrified expression. The blade is then dropped into a mossy koi bed, and the blood soaks the water. The killer has been rumored to be the Crown Prince or the "late" King. Firstly, it has been argued the Crown Prince did not die from the poison on the knife due to the fact that the poison was different from that of the Empress and hence less venomous. Furthermore, the sword that was used to kill the Empress has been argued to be that of the Crown Prince. Secondly, it is believed that it was the "late" King who set up the scheme in order to eliminate his rivals. Hence, he did not die from drinking the wine as it seems to be from a different cup and seemingly contained no wine, just water. On a further note, it has been been said that there was not a physical person who killed the Empress but rather the event itself was a metaphor for corruption, greed and desire of the human heart.
Cast:
• Zhang Ziyi as the Empress Wan (a modified "Gertrude")
• Ge You as the Emperor Li ("Claudius")
• Daniel Wu as Prince Wu Luan ("Hamlet")
• Zhou Xun as Qing Nu ("Ophelia")
• Ma Jingwu as the Grand Marshal ("Polonius")
• Huang Xiaoming as the Grand Marshal's son ("Laertes")
Trivia:
- At 180 meters long and 60 meters wide, the set for the Emperor's Palace is the largest set ever built in China.
- Gong Li was originally supposed to play Zhang Ziyi's part. Due to scheduling conflicts, the role was passed onto Zhang Ziyi and she gladly accepted because she thought the character was so interesting.
- Both Gong Li and Maggie Cheung were originally considered playing the queen's role. When Zhang Ziyi took over the part, the script was rewritten to make the character younger.
Product Details
• Actors: Ma Jingwu, Ge You, Daniel Wu, Zhou Xun, Zhang Ziyi
• Directors: Feng Xiaogang
• Format: Color, Dubbed, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: Cantonese
• Subtitles: English, Spanish
• Audio Specs: Digital Surround 5.1, Dolby Digital 2.0
• Region: Region 1
• Number of discs: 2
• Studio: Dragon Dynasty
• DVD Release Date: February 26, 2008
• Run Time: 126 minutes
• Release Date: February 26, 2008 (Order Your Copy Now!)
Asian Home Cinema-Meter:
Story: 7/10 – Actors: 7/10 – Ending: 6/10 – Overall: 7/10
The old time Asian tale: “Lust, Caution”, “The Warlords”, “Shadows in the Palace”, “Epitaph”, “The Evil Twins”
(Writing Source: Wikipedia, IMDB, Amazon)
by Dragon Dynasty which had re-titled it to “Legend of the Black Scorpion”, why they have decided to rename the movie on its DVD release might be will eludes us a little but this stunningly stylist film which story is loosely adapted from William Shakespeare’s popular story “Hamlet” is still very worth to complete our home cinema collection while it has all of those strikingly beautiful cinematography, sumptuous set, costumes and stunningly choreographed fight scenes that will give a lot of pleasure to our eyes. A retelling of Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” set in 907AD, during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period following the fall of the Tang Dynasty, directed by mainland director Feng Xiao Gang who raised his name with Hong Kong action drama “A World Without Thieves”. “Black Scorpion” is one of the biggest budgeted Chinese films ever made as with “The Warlords” or “Curse of the Golden Flowers.”
Below is the film synopsis from Wikipedia that had compared it with the Hamlet’s plot and characterizations:The Crown Prince Wu Luan was four years older than "Little Wan" (later Empress Wan) and they both felt for each other when his father, Emperor, decided to marry "Little Wan" and she became Empress Wan. Wu Luan, deeply hurt by this, fled to the South to rejoice in music and dance. Emperor Li (Shakespeare's Claudius) then murdered his brother and upon acceding the throne, and taken his brother's young wife, Empress Wan (younger version of Shakespeare's Gertrude), who he previously molested, as his wife and has her recrowned as Empress. The usurping emperor then sents out riders to assassinate his nephew, Crown Prince Wu Luan (Shakespeare's Hamlet), who would succeed the throne before any of his uncle's progeny. The crown prince, away at a retreat for masked mime actors, survives the massacre at the monastery and is eventually spirited back to the palace. To keep him alive, Empress Wan has made a compromise with his uncle, which angers Prince Wu Luan. His relationship with his stepmother is unusual because they grew up together in the court, are about the same age and she has romantic feelings for him. However, the prince is engaged to marry Qing Nu (Shakespeare's Ophelia), the daughter of a palace official, the Grand Marshal (who can be linked to Shakespeare's Polonius). A close ally of the former emperor, the Grand Marshall's power is weakened when his son (Shakespeare's Laertes), who is very protective of his sister, Qing Nu, is sent to a distant province to become governor. Meanwhile, the Empress Wan is to have a new coronation ceremony. As a special treat, Prince Wu Luan, an accomplished singer and dancer, stages a masked mime play that exposes his uncle as his father's murderer. Rather than kill the prince and risk alienating Empress Wan, the emperor decides the prince would be traded as a hostage for the prince of a neighboring kingdom, the Khitans, although it is known that the neighbor prince is an imposter. An ambush by the emperor's men is set up in a far away, snowy land, but the Grand Marshal's son saves the prince.
Believing that power is firmly in his grip, the emperor calls for a grand banquet. Qing Nu, the Grand Marshal's daughter, has planned another play for the occasion, and in tribute to her fiance, she wears his theater mask. Empress Wan has her own plans – to poison the emperor. However, the scheme to poison the emperor fails as the cup he was to drink out of is instead given to Qing Nu out of respect and partly of pity for her. Upon the young woman's death, the emperor realises in horror that the empress Wan had plotted his death. It is then revealed that Crown Prince Wu Luan was in fact a member of the masked performing troupe. The emperor then commits suicide by drinking the rest of the poisoned wine intended for him. As Empress Wan asks Wu Luan to kill her, the Grand Marshal's son attempts to kill the Empress to avenge his sister, but his poisoned blade is stopped by Prince Wu Luan and Empress Wan stabs the Grand Marshal's son. However, Prince Wu Luan fatally poisons himself in the process of stopping the Grand Marshal's son. In the end sequence, Empress Wan grasps bright red cloth ands speaks of the "flames of desire" that she has satiated by taking the throne. She is suddenly pierced by a blade from an unknown source. As she is dying, she turns around and looks at her killer with a horrified expression. The blade is then dropped into a mossy koi bed, and the blood soaks the water. The killer has been rumored to be the Crown Prince or the "late" King. Firstly, it has been argued the Crown Prince did not die from the poison on the knife due to the fact that the poison was different from that of the Empress and hence less venomous. Furthermore, the sword that was used to kill the Empress has been argued to be that of the Crown Prince. Secondly, it is believed that it was the "late" King who set up the scheme in order to eliminate his rivals. Hence, he did not die from drinking the wine as it seems to be from a different cup and seemingly contained no wine, just water. On a further note, it has been been said that there was not a physical person who killed the Empress but rather the event itself was a metaphor for corruption, greed and desire of the human heart.Cast:
• Zhang Ziyi as the Empress Wan (a modified "Gertrude")
• Ge You as the Emperor Li ("Claudius")
• Daniel Wu as Prince Wu Luan ("Hamlet")
• Zhou Xun as Qing Nu ("Ophelia")
• Ma Jingwu as the Grand Marshal ("Polonius")
• Huang Xiaoming as the Grand Marshal's son ("Laertes")
Trivia:- At 180 meters long and 60 meters wide, the set for the Emperor's Palace is the largest set ever built in China.
- Gong Li was originally supposed to play Zhang Ziyi's part. Due to scheduling conflicts, the role was passed onto Zhang Ziyi and she gladly accepted because she thought the character was so interesting.
- Both Gong Li and Maggie Cheung were originally considered playing the queen's role. When Zhang Ziyi took over the part, the script was rewritten to make the character younger.
Product Details• Actors: Ma Jingwu, Ge You, Daniel Wu, Zhou Xun, Zhang Ziyi
• Directors: Feng Xiaogang
• Format: Color, Dubbed, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: Cantonese
• Subtitles: English, Spanish
• Audio Specs: Digital Surround 5.1, Dolby Digital 2.0
• Region: Region 1
• Number of discs: 2
• Studio: Dragon Dynasty
• DVD Release Date: February 26, 2008
• Run Time: 126 minutes
• Release Date: February 26, 2008 (Order Your Copy Now!
)Asian Home Cinema-Meter:
Story: 7/10 – Actors: 7/10 – Ending: 6/10 – Overall: 7/10
The old time Asian tale: “Lust, Caution”, “The Warlords”, “Shadows in the Palace”, “Epitaph”, “The Evil Twins”
(Writing Source: Wikipedia, IMDB, Amazon)
1 Comments:
Thanks for the nice, complete synopses!