Curse of the Golden Flower

Curse of the Golden Flower
Theatrical release poster
Traditional Chinese滿城盡帶黃金甲
Simplified Chinese满城尽带黄金甲
Literal meaningThe entire city is full of golden armor
Hanyu PinyinMǎnchéng jìndài huángjīnjiǎ
Directed byZhang Yimou
Written byZhang Yimou
Based onThunderstorm
by Cao Yu (play)
and Shakespeare's
Hamlet
Produced byWilliam Kong
Zhang Weiping
Zhang Yimou
Starring
CinematographyZhao Xiaoding
Music byShigeru Umebayashi
Production
company
Edko Film
Distributed byBeijing New Picture Film Company[1]
Release date
  • December 21, 2006 (2006-12-21)
Running time
114 minutes
CountryChina
LanguageMandarin
Budget$45 million[2]
Box office$78,568,977[1]

Curse of the Golden Flower (Chinese: 满城尽带黄金甲) is a 2006 Chinese epic wuxia drama film written and directed by Zhang Yimou. The Mandarin Chinese title of the movie is taken from the last line of the Qi dynasty poem written by the rebel leader Huang Chao, who had revolted against the Tang dynasty.

With a budget of US$45 million, it was at the time of its release the most expensive Chinese film to date, surpassing Chen Kaige's The Promise.[2] It was chosen as China's entry for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film for the year 2006,[3] but did not receive the nomination. The film was nominated for Costume Design. In 2007, it received fourteen nominations at the 26th Hong Kong Film Awards and won Best Actress for Gong Li, Art Direction, Best Costume and Make Up Design and Best Original Film Song for "菊花台" (Chrysanthemum Terrace) by Jay Chou.[4]

The plot is based on Cao Yu's 1934 play Thunderstorm (雷雨 pinyin: Léiyǔ), but is set in the Imperial court in ancient China.

  1. ^ a b "Curse of the Golden Flower". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 15 November 2021.
  2. ^ a b Wang (2006-02-27). "Zhang Yimou raises "Armor"". CCTV International. Zhang Yimou raises "Armor" a budget of 360 million yuan, or around 45 million US dollars
  3. ^ "'Curse,' 'The Banquet' picked as Oscar entries" Archived 2016-03-03 at the Wayback Machine, Associated Press via Chinadotcom, October 3, 2006.
  4. ^ (in Chinese) Hong Kong Film Awards official homepage 26th Hong Kong Film Awards winner/nomination list Archived 2016-03-04 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 2011-06-15