Farewell, My Concubine

aka Ba Wang Bie Ji
Chen Kaige, 1993, China (8.2*)
A lengthy Chinese epic of three hours that covers 50 years in the lives of two Chinese opera singing stage brothers, and their romantic entanglement with the same woman. This ambitious epic weaves these stories around the history of China and its tumultuous changes over the entire 20th century. Perhaps a bit slow overall, this is nevertheless a huge scale accomplishment with a traditional epic look that is well worth seeing, featuring some classic scenes of war with thousands of extras.

Another epic of Kaige's worth seeing is The Emperor and the Assassin (1998), which won a technical jury prize at Cannes for production design. A royal courtroom where visitors approach the king by nearly walking on water is unlike anything else in cinema.