Evan D. As a project this year we are taking a trip through time to revisit all of the Best Picture winners in history, Wings to Anora. The Last Emperor is the sixtieth film in that series, to see all the other Best Picture reviews, click here. China’s final emperor ascended to the throne in 1908, the same year Henry Ford released the first Model T car in the United States. What must it have been like to be a living embodiment of an ancient tradition in such a modern age? At the time he assumed rule of China, the emperor was just 3 years old. To wield more power than you can even understand and grow up surrounded by palace walls and sycophants must alter the development of a young mind. There are many interesting questions posed by the life of Emperor Puyi (played as an adult by John Lone) but Bernardo Bertolucci’s biography of him, The Last Emperor, does little find a compelling hook. Puyi actually was not emperor of China for very long. While the child king presided over his servants in the Forbidden City into his twenties, he actually only ruled his country for about 10 years. We see him callously lash out against his caretakers, perhaps in response to the deep isolation he feels being a prisoner in his own palace. The young emperor cannot see the socio-political changes roiling China outside the imperial walls, but those changes come for him nonetheless. Exiled in his early twenties, Puyi becomes something of a playboy and forms close ties with the Japanese emperor. He sees a strategic alliance as a way of returning to power. The Japanese proceed to install Puyi as emperor of Manhukuo (their name for Manchuria after capturing it from the Chinese.) Of course, siding with Japan put the now puppet emperor on the losing end of World War II. After the war, Puyi is sent to a real prison, smaller but not so dissimilar in feeling to the gilded one in which he spent his formative years. The contradictions central to The Last Emperor are tantalizingly ripe for exploration. How fascinating to explore the ways in which the most powerful man in China is not really a man but a toddler. Would it not be so interesting to see what that pressure does to a developing boy? Or what it means for governance of one of the largest countries in the world that it’s leader cannot yet form full sentences. These are lightly touched on early in the film, but Bertolucci treats them as little curiosities in what is really a pretty standard biopic. As Puyi ages, more psychological queries come to fore. As he navigates prison later in life it is easy to see the parallels to his youth, when he was not allowed to leave the Forbidden City. Seeing the Japanese control him with the nominal title of emperor, begs questions about how much power he ever really had. Again these complexities are mostly set dressing and we see very little of the emotional toll levied on the protagonist. Although The Last Emperor is essentially a run of the mill biography in plot, it is an exceptionally beautiful one. The first western-made film to be granted access to the Forbidden City, Bertolucci took full advantage of the stunning architecture. Its walls and gates may serve as a cell for Puyi, but what an awe inspiring cage it is. The film crew recognized that it’s location was a star and let it shine as such. Similarly, the score is tremendously impressive. Composed by the legendary Ryuichi Sakamoto (who also plays a role in the film) and David Byrne, the score is this unique blend of tradition and modernity. It serves to underline the role of Puyi as this sort of bridge between imperial and republican rule in China. Like its subject, The Last Emperor is hard to pin down and full of contradictions. An epic work of craft that looks bigger than it feels. A film that elicits more questions than it is willing or able to answer. 6/10
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