Review Of 1991 Raise the Red Lantern

I had watched this movie not long after it came out. I watched it in 1994 and for some reason, this movie has stuck with me. It offers everything in one movie—a massive film of an overabundance of emotions. For a woman having to share one man, you can only imagine all the feelings going on in this movie.

Set in the 1920s, the film tells the story of a young woman who becomes one of the concubines of a wealthy man during the Warlord Era. A 19-year-old that had just lost her father and her family had gone bankrupt. This young girl was then sold by her stepmother to the wealthy family becoming the 4th mistress of this man whom they call master.

When she first came to the palace she was seeing the master frequently. When it is a mistress's turn with the master they get their part of the palace lit up in red lanterns and they get a foot massage along with their choice of the meal that all the mistresses have to also eat.

The first mistress already did not much care about being with the master. She had come to terms she was old and she gave the master a son decades ago. She knew she would never be going anywhere. She knew she would be passed over for the young mistresses and was ok with that.

The second mistress becomes friends with the new mistress and welcomes her into the family. The second mistress had warned her of the third mistress and she was not to be trusted. She is spoiled and is upset she is not the youngest anymore.

As time goes by she learns that it is the second mistress that shouldn’t be trusted not the third. Also has to deal with her maid that had an affair with the master a couple of times the maid thinks she will become a mistress one day and does not like her. Seems to me she is just jealous that the master got a new mistress and not taken the maid as a mistress. So she takes that out on the new mistress instead of properly being a maid to her.

With everything going on she decided to fake a pregnancy to get the master at her side more than the others. Until it was found to be fake. So the master covered her lanterns in black permanently. She blamed it on her maid and how her maid treated her and tried to pretend to be a mistress with her red lanterns. So all the maid's lanterns were burned. Not long after the maid fell ill and died at the hospital.

The fourth mistress soon sees the real meaning of all this. She describes it as all the mistresses are the master's robes that he can throw away at his discretion.

Soon the fourth mistress decides being in solitude is better than living in this house, and even talks of suicide. On her 20th birthday, she gets drunk and accidentally blurts out about the third mistress and the house doctor having an affair. Was eventually caught having this affair. Following old customs and traditions, the third mistress was taken to the room of death where servants hung her. The fourth mistress witness the whole thing and already not being of sound mind, went completely insane.

At the end of the movie, the fourth mistress was seen wandering around the palace in her school uniform seemly insane by the newest mistress of the master.

If you can handle reading subtitles and this seems like a movie you might like, check it out. For some reason now over 25 years this movie has stuck in my mind and it was super good when I had seen it. Hope you enjoy it too.