"As ravishing and exotic as Zhang Yimou's earlier works (Red Sorghum and Ju Dou, 1991 PSIFF), Raise the Red Lantern revels in the twists and turns that human fate can take, focusing on the labyrinthine complexities that divide the four wives of an aging patriarch in 1920s China. Gong Li, who starred in both of the director's earlier works, plays Songlian, the daughter of an impoverished family pressured into marriage with an older, wealthy landowner. As his fourth wife, she is accorded all the rights and privileges of the other three wives, including her own house and servant girl, but it is soon apparent that the other three wives pass their days plotting to gain the attentions of their shared husband. Songlian quickly find herself not only at war with her maid, Yan'er, But also locked into a treacherous rivalry with the other three wives. The husband has red lanterns lit and hung outside the house of the wife with whom he chooses to spend the night, and this elaborate and beautiful ritual presages the schemes and manipulations of which he is the victim. Breathtakingly beautiful, Raise the Red Lantern is a haunting and unforgettable work." -PSIFF 1992