Release CalendarTop 250 MoviesMost Popular MoviesBrowse Movies by GenreTop Box OfficeShowtimes & TicketsMovie NewsIndia Movie Spotlight
    What's on TV & StreamingTop 250 TV ShowsMost Popular TV ShowsBrowse TV Shows by GenreTV NewsIndia TV Spotlight
    What to WatchLatest TrailersIMDb OriginalsIMDb PicksIMDb Podcasts
    OscarsBest Picture WinnersBest Picture WinnersEmmysHispanic & Latino VoicesSTARmeter AwardsSan Diego Comic-ConNew York Comic-ConSundance Film FestivalToronto Int'l Film FestivalAwards CentralFestival CentralAll Events
    Born TodayMost Popular CelebsMost Popular CelebsCelebrity News
    Help CenterContributor ZonePolls
For Industry Professionals
  • All
  • Titles
  • TV Episodes
  • Celebs
  • Companies
  • Keywords
  • Advanced Search
Watchlist
Sign In
  • Fully supported
  • English (United States)
    Partially supported
  • Français (Canada)
  • Français (France)
  • Deutsch (Deutschland)
  • हिंदी (भारत)
  • Italiano (Italia)
  • Português (Brasil)
  • Español (España)
  • Español (México)
  • Cast & crew
  • User reviews
  • Trivia
IMDbPro

Punainen lyhty

Original title: Da hong deng long gao gao gua
  • 19911991
  • K-10K-10
  • 2h 5m
IMDb RATING
8.1/10
33K
YOUR RATING
POPULARITY
10,476
264
Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
A young woman becomes the fourth wife of a wealthy lord, and must learn to live with the strict rules and tensions within the household.
Play trailer3:23
1 Video
99+ Photos
DramaHistoryRomance

A young woman becomes the fourth wife of a wealthy lord, and must learn to live with the strict rules and tensions within the household.A young woman becomes the fourth wife of a wealthy lord, and must learn to live with the strict rules and tensions within the household.A young woman becomes the fourth wife of a wealthy lord, and must learn to live with the strict rules and tensions within the household.

IMDb RATING
8.1/10
33K
YOUR RATING
POPULARITY
10,476
264
  • Director
    • Yimou Zhang
  • Writers
    • Tong Su(original novel "Wives and Concubines" by)
    • Ni Zhen(scriptwriter)
  • Stars
    • Gong Li
    • Jingwu Ma
    • Saifei He
Top credits
  • Director
    • Yimou Zhang
  • Writers
    • Tong Su(original novel "Wives and Concubines" by)
    • Ni Zhen(scriptwriter)
  • Stars
    • Gong Li
    • Jingwu Ma
    • Saifei He
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 132User reviews
    • 49Critic reviews
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Nominated for 1 Oscar
      • 25 wins & 16 nominations total

    Videos1

    Official Trailer
    Trailer 3:23
    Official Trailer

    Photos104

    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li and Saifei He in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Gong Li
    Gong Li
    • Songlian
    Jingwu Ma
    • The Master
    Saifei He
    Saifei He
    • Meishan (Third Wife)
    Cuifen Cao
    • Zhuoyan (Second Wife)
    Qi Zhao
    • Housekeeper
    Lin Kong
    • Yan'er
    Shuyuan Jin
    • Yuru (First Wife)
    Weimin Ding
    • Songlian's Mother
    • (voice)
    Zengyin Cao
    • Old Servant
    • (as Zhengyin Cao)
    Zhigang Cui
    • Dr. Gao
    • (as Zhihgang Cui)
    Chu Xiao
    • Feipu
    Espérance Pham Thai Lan
    Espérance Pham Thai Lan
    • Kids - Concubines
    • (uncredited)
    • Director
      • Yimou Zhang
    • Writers
      • Tong Su(original novel "Wives and Concubines" by)
      • Ni Zhen(scriptwriter)
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      This film was banned in China for a short time in the early 1990s.
    • Goofs
      Around 01:18:59, there is a lot of smoke in front of the third wife. And there is almost no smoke in front of the second one.
    • Quotes

      The Third Concubine: Good or bad, it's all playacting. If you act well, you can fool other people; if you do it badly, you can only fool yourself, and when you can't even fool yourself, you just can fool the ghosts.

    • Connections
      Featured in Siskel & Ebert & the Movies: Straight Talk/Rock-a-Doodle/Thunderheart/Beethoven/Raise the Red Lantern (1992)

    User reviews132

    Review
    Review
    Featured review
    Four Houses
    I had a good day, so I selected this film. I have several films that I reserve for good days because I know they will reward. Its a sort of celebration that will send me into rich dreams, annotating my life.

    This has two known qualities that you, dear reader, can expect without knowing anything about the film itself.

    First, you will know that this is a woman directed by someone deeply in love with her. This doesn't always produce great films, but when the director is inherently cinematic, it often evokes something deep in the viewer. There is nothing in the world like looking on the face — the person — you are centered on. A million subtle decisions are made in each scene, summing to an effect that cannot be missed. If this had poor narrative qualities (and some of their films did) it would still have this quality of seeing into a soulmate deeply enough to be able to animate the skin.

    Its quite interesting when you consider the woman. If you see her outside of film, or in films made by ordinary eyes, she is quite ordinary. She has an atypical Chinese body: busty and widehipped. She is poised but doesn't have the neck or cheekboned face of other Asian women. Only under this man's eye is she a goddess. You can see this in the very first shot.

    The second thing you can count on is the architectural anchoring of the thing. This man knows how to use space. He uses it in the cinematic narrative, for example, if you replay the shots where the house of death is shown, and then the last encounter with it... And if you understand why the decisions about handling distance and surfaces were made they way they were, you will have entered a zone where from now on you will not be able to reason without reasoning with place.

    But there are other handlings of space: As with some of his other films, the building is a character. Its the noir narrator who sets the rules — often arbitrary — under which all characters are bound to operate, and which drives the narrative. Its a particularly western notion, this, and has gotten our hero in trouble, even banned. This part is following Welles and Kubrick.

    But he goes further than either of them with this notion that the light both has agency of its own (it selects which of the four wives gets a foot massage and sex) and is a part of the fabric of the buildings. The redness changes the spaces it occupies, bringing intrigue with the sex, desire for several things. Its quite layered, what is going on. These lanterns are the real master; in fact the person who inhabits the master's body is hardly even there. We never see his face.

    Because of the extensive use of hard planes and selfish light, there aren't many fabric effects here, as we'll see elsewhere.

    I am tempted to designate this as one of my two allowed "must see before you die" films of 1991. But I'm in too good a mood to make such a serious decision.

    Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.
    helpful•26
    13
    • tedg
    • Mar 19, 2008

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • August 7, 1992 (Finland)
    • Countries of origin
      • China
      • Hong Kong
    • Language
      • Mandarin
    • Also known as
      • Raise the Red Lantern
    • Filming locations
      • Taiyuan, Shanxi, China
    • Production companies
      • ERA International
      • China Film Co-Production Corporation
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    • Gross US & Canada
      • $2,603,061
    • Opening weekend US & Canada
      • $22,554
      • Mar 15, 1992
    • Gross worldwide
      • $2,603,061
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      2 hours 5 minutes
    • Color
      • Color
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.85 : 1

    Related news

    Contribute to this page

    Suggest an edit or add missing content
    Gong Li in Punainen lyhty (1991)
    Top Gap
    By what name was Punainen lyhty (1991) officially released in Canada in French?
    Answer
    • See more gaps
    • Learn more about contributing
    Edit page

    More to explore

    View image
    Photos
    Trending: Stars to Watch
    See the gallery
    View list
    List
    IMDb's Top 50 TV Dramas
    See the full list
    View image
    Photos
    We Love These Hollywood Power Couples
    See the gallery

    Recently viewed

    Please enable browser cookies to use this feature. Learn more.
    Get the IMDb App
    Sign in for more access
    Sign in for more access
    • Get the IMDb App
    • Help
    • Site Index
    • IMDbPro
    • Box Office Mojo
    • IMDb Developer
    • Press Room
    • Advertising
    • Jobs
    • Conditions of Use
    • Privacy Policy
    • Interest-Based Ads
    IMDb, an Amazon company

    © 1990-2022 by IMDb.com, Inc.