Ju Dou

PG-13

Released Mar 6, 1990

1h 38m

Drama

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100%

20 Reviews

Tomatometer

89%

5,000+ Ratings

Audience Score

Ju Dou (Gong Li), the young bride of Yang Jin-shan (Wei Li), who is the tyrannical owner of a silk-dyeing business, is forced to endure her husband's violent tendencies and condescending nature. Although Ju Dou finds temporary solace in the arms of her husband's nephew, Tian-qing (Baotian Li), problems arise when Ju Dou gets pregnant. The couple then desperately tries to hide their passionate romance while convincing the merciless Jin-shan that the child is his.

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Jonathan Rosenbaum

Chicago Reader

Visually stunning, with ravishing uses of color and beautifully modulated lap dissolves...

Rated: 3/4

May 24, 2022

Full Review

Owen Gleiberman

Entertainment Weekly

Rated: B

Sep 7, 2011

Full Review

Variety Staff

Variety

The picture is, indeed, as deliriously enjoyable as it sounds, but with the added dimension of age-old tradition forcing the characters into roles they don't want to play.

Jul 6, 2010

Full Review

Rene Jordan

El Nuevo Herald (Miami)

There is no limit in listing the many virtues of Ju Dou. [Full review in Spanish]

Jan 21, 2023

Full Review

Emanuel Levy

EmanuelLevy.Com

Powerful, poignant, and visually stunning, Zhang Yimou's Ju Dou was deservedly nominated for the Best Foreign Language Oscar.

Rated: A

Feb 19, 2011

Full Review

Amber Wilkinson

Eye for Film

As well as having an eye for the dramatic - such as yards of cloth tumbling from a height or flames licking up a wall - Yimou also has a way of conveying the emotion of a scene with incredible brevity.

Rated: 4.5/5

Jun 13, 2008

Full Review

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Yellowfur D

Whether it is a village or a small town, criticism and tragedy have been written. I saw resistance, and actually I saw true feelings, without words, burning like wildfire.

Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars

10/07/23

Full Review

andrea m

This early effort by the acclaimed Zhang Yimou is a masterfully crafted tragedy set in rural China, at the same time gritty and poetic. It tells the story of a rich and sadistic man whose newly purchased wife falls (conveniently?) in love with the nephew of her husband. It is a story where no one is innocent, and everyone a victim. It is a visual masterpiece, even though the aspect ratio is quite a double-edged sword: the fullscreen contributes to the idea of enclosure of the characters, but the gorgeous shots in technicolor of the hanging drapes would have been much more striking in widescreen. Speaking of enclosure, I truly admire how the rich man's life is depicted. The more he loses his body, the more he is absorbed by wood, the skeleton of his family business, and gains power. First losing his legs and being enclosed in a barrel, and that's when he starts to have influence on the family heir; then enclosed in the coffin, literally trumping over his kin and fostering the revenge bound to strike. The final flames are but a welcome purifying force, in a world where even the most innocent child is burdened with the schemes and sins of his family, resulting in the embodiment of grudge. However, I must say that I struggle to understand the social and family order depicted in the movie, and just a basic form of communication would have prevented the creation of the parricidal monster. The characters' passivity is hard to condone.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

david l

Ju Dou is an early Zhang Yimou film that's far from his best efforts, though it does benefit from a rare use of Technicolor so late in the century and a wonderfully old-fashioned approach at storytelling. It's a traditional tragedy that is quite touching, but the cruelty of the third act was misplaced and difficult to believe, ending the story in an overly nasty manner.

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

peter w

Zhang Yimou brings his unfailing aestheticism to a challenging theme. Sometimes beauty can divert attention away from problematic themes but he manages to draw the audience in to the stark issues of inequality and oppression. He doesn't romanticize power or its lack; instead, every scene intensifies the anguish that it creates. Even when he captures brief moments of happiness or relief it serves as a contrast to the tragedy that follows.

Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

william d

Gong Li is her usual brilliant self, but the story just isn't as compelling as the movie's pretensions suggest.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

freeson w

Ju Dou is a remarkably small and simple film, with only a couple of actors and one main location. But it is very powerful. I love the way the story didn't go the way I thought it would go. After the affair is discovered, I had no clue what was going to happen, and that was a great feeling.

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

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Yimou Zhang

Director

Gong Li

Ju Dou

Baotian Li

Yang Tian-qing

Wei Li

Yang Jin-shan

Zhang Yi

Tianbai as child

Zhen Ji-an

Yang Tian-bai as a Youth

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Synopsis

Ju Dou (Gong Li), the young bride of Yang Jin-shan (Wei Li), who is the tyrannical owner of a silk-dyeing business, is forced to endure her husband's violent tendencies and condescending nature. Although Ju Dou finds temporary solace in the arms of her husband's nephew, Tian-qing (Baotian Li), problems arise when Ju Dou gets pregnant. The couple then desperately tries to hide their passionate romance while convincing the merciless Jin-shan that the child is his.

Director: Yimou Zhang
Distributor: Miramax Films
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Drama
Original Language: Chinese
Release Date (Theaters): Mar 6, 1990, Original
Release Date (Streaming): Jan 3, 2019
Box Office (Gross USA): $10.3K
Runtime: 1h 38m
Sound Mix: Surround

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