The Last Emperor (1987)

The Last Emperor tells the story of the life of Puyi, China's last emperor. The films pretty much tells the story of his life from his coronation at age 3 until his death in 1967. The film is set up like a frame story. In this part of the story, Puyi is in a prison and tells the story of his life before being imprisoned. There are also flash forwards to his life after prison. While this film was highly-acclaimed, I found it rather dull.

The role of the emperor is played by John Lone. He plays the emperor from about age 18 until his death at age 61 so he has pretty good range. The film stars Peter O'Toole in a supporting role, but he wasn't all that interesting.

This film was very well received by critics. The film was nominated for nine Academy Awards, including best picture, and won all nine of them. While I did not find the film all that enjoyable, I agree with most of these Oscars. The film won for categories like original music, costume design, and cinematography. This film was very artistic in nature so I can't imagine another film was better in those categories. The Academy tends to favor epic films and this film is indeed an epic so it's probably worthy of best picture in addition to its other awards.

68/100
D+

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