Pao Da Shuang Deng (1994)

A woman inherits her father's fireworks factory, as he had no son. The business does well and everything works in an orderly fashion until one day, an itinerant painter is hired to decorate... See full summary »

Director:

Ping He

Writers:

Feng Jicai (novel), Daying Ye

Stars:

Jing Ning, Gang Wu, Xiaorui Zhao

8 wins & 5 nominations.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Jing Ning	...	Cai Chunzhi
Gang Wu	...	Niu Bao
Xiaorui Zhao	...	Dihong
Yang Gao	...	Butler
Zhengyun Xu	...	Old Master Xu (as Xu Zhengyun)
Liang Zhao	...	Hei Liu
Xingmao Ju	...	Bao Ge
Yusheng Li	...	Manservant
Lu Hui	...	Old Boss Wang
Liyuan Wang	...	Wang Ma
Bolin Zhang	...	Businessman

Storyline

A woman inherits her father's fireworks factory, as he had no son. The business does well and everything works in an orderly fashion until one day, an itinerant painter is hired to decorate the doors and vases at the factory. The woman, forbidden to marry and thereby involve outsiders in the factory ownership, finds herself drawn to the headstrong painter. When they fall in love, the situation throws her entire life into disarray.

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Plot Keywords:

painter | fireworks | yellow river | teenage girl | shanxi china | 

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Genres:

Drama | Romance

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for language

Details

Country:

China Hong Kong

Language:

Mandarin

Release Date:

2 June 1995 (USA)

Also Known As:

Fino all'ultimo fuoco

Box Office

Gross USA:

$272,232

Company Credits

Production Co:

Beijing Salon Films,Xi'an Film Studio,Yung & Associate

Technical Specs

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

User Reviews

Interesting inversion

A brief conversation, together with an interesting inversion of traditional roles, keeps "Red Firecracker, Green Firecracker" (1994) timely. When the female Boss (who habitually wears men's clothes) speaks privately with an itinerant male artisan who is newly-arrived to her family's company town, the entire Confucian system is undermined in a single sentence. Yet, in another scene, the Boss is concerned that traditional rules be followed when paying workers – and again, that traditional punishment be meted out to a worker who caused a fire in the factory. No one questions this 30-something woman, not even male elders in their 70s. She is accepted in her role as The Boss. However, as the story continues, and the boss falls in love with the artisan, all bets are off. She changes her hair (watch out!) and dons traditional female garb. Then she announces to everyone that she is tired of being the boss, and that she wants to be a woman. What?! No one, absolutely no one, accepts her statement of wishes. So, everyone plots… Hmm. It's an interesting inversion, but perhaps one should not make too much of it.

NB. A revision of earlier (nearly incomprehensible) English subtitles has been uploaded to opensubtitles.com – not perfect, but an improvement. At a minimum, the revision is more coherent.