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Avg. Critic Score: 70 out of 100 Generally favorable reviews Metascore® based on all critic reviews
Information for Parents:
15 Iffy for 15+
Read Common Sense Media review

Critic scores range from 0 to 100, with higher scores indicating more favorable reviews.

  • 100
    Philadelphia Inquirer | Steven Rea

    A dazzling costume epic, a spectacle for the eyes and for the soul. Read full review

  • 90
    Washington Post | Stephen Hunter

    Zhang Yimou's Curse of the Golden Flower is a kind of feast, an over-the-top, all-stops-pulled-out lollapalooza that means to play kitschy and grand at once. Read full review

  • 90
    Los Angeles Times | Kevin Thomas

    A period spectacle, steeped in awesome splendor and lethal palace intrigue, it climaxes in a stupendous battle scene and epic tragedy. Read full review

  • 80
    The New York Times | Jeannette Catsoulis

    Since his debut in 1987 with "Red Sorghum" Mr. Zhang has made more controlled films but never one that's more fun. With Curse of the Golden Flower he aims for Shakespeare and winds up with Jacqueline Susann. And a good thing too. Read full review

  • 75
    San Francisco Chronicle | Ruthe Stein

    Like a soap opera, but most of what glitters is gold. Read full review

  • 75
    USA Today | Claudia Puig

    The Curse of the Golden Flower is the year's most operatic and visually lavish film. Read full review

  • 75
    Rolling Stone | Peter Travers

    The final effect is stunning, but also sadly impersonal. Read full review

  • 67
    Entertainment Weekly | Owen Gleiberman

    Curse of the Golden Flower is a watchable soap opera, but its marching-band martial-arts scenes are little more than weakly staged retreads of the ones in Zhang's "Hero." Read full review

  • 63
    Boston Globe | Wesley Morris

    As easy as this movie is to watch, it's artificially flavored. "Golden Flower" runs on crocodile tears and corn-syrup blood. Read full review

  • 60
    Variety | Robert Koehler

    Zhang Yimou's strangest and most troubled film, abounds in hysterical, mannered Tang Dynasty-era palace intrigue and dehumanized CGI battle sequences. Read full review

View more reviews for Curse of the Golden Flower on Metacritic

Information for Parents
Common Sense Media says Iffy for 15+ Violent, operatic saga of cruelty and revenge.
What Parents Need to Know Parents need to know that kids who liked Hero or House of Flying Daggers will want to see this movie. But while Zhang Yimou directed all of them, this new film is very different -- it's less focused on the martial arts action than on adult themes like betrayal and revenge. Violence includes poisoning, swordfights, knifings, and armies of assassins mustered for combat on palace. There are plenty of bloody results all around.
  • Families can talk about the tension among the family members. How do jealousy and greed lead to betrayal? Does the film make a judgment about which of the characters is the most guilty, or do they all seem equally culpable? How do parents use their children against one another? How does the movie's grand display -- bright colors, sweeping costumes, dramatic entrances -- suggest opera? If you've seen the director's other movies, how does this one compare? Why do you think it's focused less on action and more on revenge?
The good stuff
  • message true0 Positive messages: The emperor and empress plot against each another, using their children as pawns; corruption in palace among royals and servants; violent showdown leaves everyone hurt or dead.
What to watch for
  • violence false5 Violence: The emperor is poisoning his wife with a fungus in her medicine (she coughs and faints occasionally); swordplay is swift, bloody, and climactic; characters have scars/brands indicating previous abuses; some one-on-one fighting (punching, slapping, kicking); assault by army of assassins features flaming arrows, hooks, spears, knives, and swords; a character stabs himself in the throat (he lives, with bloody bandages visible in later scenes); a character commits suicide by slashing his own throat (gruesome but brief).
  • sex false3 Sex: The empress is having an affair with her stepson; Wan and Chan have secret affair (they're surprised while half-dressed); the empress' cleavage is frequently visible.
  • language false0 Language: Not an issue
  • consumerism false0 Consumerism: Not an issue
  • drugsalcoholtobacco false0 Drinking, drugs and smoking: Not an issue
An independent nonprofit dedicated to providing families the information they need to help kids thrive in a world of media and technology. © Common Sense Media Inc. 2010. All rights reserved.

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