WasAnnon Slow pace in the most part of the movie.

Micransix Crappy film

DipitySkillful an ambitious but ultimately ineffective debut endeavor.

Clarissa Mora The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

lastliberal An Oscar nominee for it's brilliant cinematography, and a Golden Globe nominee for Best Foreign Language Film (lost to Les misérables), this film is directed by Zhang Yimou and stars Gong Li. They worked previously on five films: Red Sorghum, Ju Dou, Raise the Red Lantern, The Story of Qui Ju and To Live.14-year old Shuisheng (Wang Xiao Xiao) is brought in from the country to serve the Boss' mistress Bijou (Gong Li), who he can't control.Shuisheng soon finds that she is not a nice person, and he gets back at her when he can.I especially liked the bar scenes where Bijou performed. It had the right mix of beautiful costumes and smokiness.But, this was a gangster picture, so things end badly for some.

Dennis Littrell This could be an American gangster movie except that it is so beautiful. Well, that and the fact that it takes place in Shanghai in the 1930s. Gong Li plays Xiao Jingbao ("Bijou") the moll, a self-centered, vain, mean, slutty songstress kept by the "Boss" (Baotian Li) of Shanghai's underworld. As usual with director Zhang Yimou every set is gorgeous and artfully planned, the story compelling, and the human psychology veracious.We see the events through the eyes of Shuisheng (Wang Xiaoxiao) a 14-year-old boy from the country who, because he is a member of the trusted Tang family, is brought to the city to be a servant to Bijou. She treats him and everybody else like dirt while she plays the Boss for a fool. We can guess that her comeuppance will be severe. Oh, but HOW severe? In this Zhang Yimou goes beyond what one has seen in American gangster movies and gives us something from Machiavelli and Genghis Kahn.The film is a little slow in parts and Gong Li plays her role so well that she is most disagreeable—that is, until what I might call the "turn." This occurs when she is forced to go with the Boss to the country after a rival has attempted to kill him. Bijou is bored. There is nothing for her to do so she goes to the house of a country widow named Cuihua (Baoying Jiang) with a nine year old daughter Ah Jiao (Yang Qianquan) to lord it over her and to amuse herself with these country bumpkins. But the surprise is that in the process she is returned to her childhood when she herself was a country bumpkin. Zhang Yimou plays this part of the film masterfully as we slowly realize that Bijou is jealous of Cuihua and her poor but idyllic life. But that is something she can never admit to herself as she spies on Cuihua with her lover. One almost gets the sense that Bijou would like to be in Cuihua's place with that crude country lover.At one point Bijou makes Cuihua loan her some of her peasant clothes and then takes delight in wearing them. We can see that Bijou is in denial about how much of a slave to the master she really is and how unsatisfying is the life of a kept woman regardless of how well kept. She realizes that her life is empty. And now we see a certain generosity of spirit: she gives the boy some silver coins; she tells the boss to spare the woman, but it is too late. Because you talked to her she knows too much, he says. He adds, you see, it is your fault again.This film sits well with the current communist government of China despite or perhaps partly because the Boss with his small round eyeglasses looks a little like a Chinese Trotsky. But more importantly Zhang Yimou's depiction of the criminal decadence of China in the 30s before the rise of communism is exactly what Maoists like to see. Communism freed the Chinese from all that, is perhaps the idea.This is not the only film of Zhang Yimou's to play to communist sensibilities. His Raise the Red Lantern (1991) also shows in a different way the moral corruption of what might be called the ancient regime. But Zhang Yimou can be forgiven for playing to the powers that be because he does it with subtle irony and for a purpose, the purpose being to give himself the celebrity and an international reputation so that he is able to make films that might in some way criticize the communist state while he maintains a position of loyalty to that state. Working from within, it might be said. We see this in his To Live (Huozhe) from 1994 in which the hardships under communism are not euphemized. To be more exact it might be said that Zhang Yimou sees the excesses of Mao's regime but realizes that Mao was a stage through which China had to pass; and at any rate, who would want to go back to the time of the capitalist gangsters? The airy, white tops of the reeds wave in the breeze. The colors are straw and the cottage on the island is neat and holds out against the rain. Inside Cuihua cooks and weaves a basket. She is content. Bijou, in her red dress and her red lips, wearing her jewelry and her superior manner, is not. She recalls the mulberry trees of her childhood and how she would climb the trees and eat the tree-ripened fruit. All the riches in the world cannot bring back those days, nor can she return to them.She would like to take nine year old Ah Jiao with her back to Shanghai. Ironically Ah Jiao in her innocence wants to be like "Miss," which is Bijou's "title." Ironically, however, it is the Boss who takes the little girl back so that she can grow into the next Bijou.The ending of the film is as brutal as anything you might expect to see, and yet there is a kind of poetic justice in what happens. In part. Zhang Yimou is always about politics, even though the politics are sometimes "just" domestic politics, as in Raise the Red Lantern. But he does the politics in a way that leaves no doubt: justice or what comes to pass is shaped by those who hold the power, whether it is the power of the state, or the power of the gangster boss, or the power of the master of the house, not by those who do not hold power. And that is the trenchant reality behind the great beauty of any Zhang Yimou film.(Note: Over 500 of my movie reviews are now available in my book "Cut to the Chaise Lounge or I Can't Believe I Swallowed the Remote!" Get it at Amazon!)

Rupert17 Shanghai Triad never gains momentum from a slow start and languid pacing until it eventually fizzles out.Gong Li looks superb and director Zhang Yimou's attention to detail and stylistic conceits never fail to impress. But the plot is overly simplistic and the characters never rise above a narrative bogged down with one dimensional characters and clichéd situations. You get the feeling Yimou was ready for something different in his career and Gong Li had played one too many parts under his direction.That said, it is entertaining without ever attaining the high standards of previous collaborations.

trpdean This is a fine movie - wonderfully acted, beautifully shot, quite simple. Without being heavy-handed, one comes to sense the presence of real evil that tempts and corrupts and destroys. It's a little slow at times because the story is so simple - yet the slowness and simplicity does allow the messages of the movie to hit home. Something else I like is that the protagonist boy is not made to be cute or winning - he just is who he is - largely an observer but sometimes acting with generosity and sometimes with contempt. Much has been said by others about the beautiful cinematography and that's certainly true - but I'm also struck by the amazing work of those who constructed or chose the sets, costumes, background characters - they were quite memorable. What a star in Gong Li, and what a director!I don't agree with those who contrast this with American movies - surely we feel the same evil in watching either version of Scarface or The Petrified Forest or The Road to Perdition. In fact, I would say this movie is most like The Road to Perdition of any I've seen - not in its story particularly but in its tone, its simplicity, its contrasts of character, its cinematography. This is also a good movie for those who say they don't like foreign movies - you'll like this one.