The film depicts the life of Pu Yi (John Lone), the last emperor of China, from his ascent to the throne as a small boy to his imprisonment and political rehabilitation by the Communist Party of China.
12 August 1952, Beijing, China
17 January 1952, Tokyo, Japan
2 August 1932, Hunslet, Leeds, Yorkshire, England, UK
2 December 1963, Harbin, Heilongjiang, China
1929, Beijing, China
24 October 1929, Nagaoka-gun, Kochi, Japan
16 September 1942, New York City, New York, USA
27 July 1927
1920, Shanghai, China
6 April 1957, West Ham, London, England, UK
13 October 1952, Hong Kong
August 23, 2016
It is the grandeur of the boy king and his unreal opulent world that is best remembered, splendid and isolated, and at last, because of its loneliness, sad.
January 07, 2014
If there is such a thing as voluptuous detachment, Bertolucci and John Lone have found it. Lone's achievement in his absorbing account of Pu Yi is to place him at a distance and yet make his plight totally involving.
January 07, 2014
There's probably a truly great movie in the story of Pu Yi, but The Last Emperor is not that movie. Still, what director Bernardo Bertolucci (Last Tango in Paris) has accomplished here is both ambitious and impressive.
February 17, 2015
As pure spectacle, "The Last Emperor" is a spellbinding peek behind the gate of a lost world.
February 22, 2013
As coolly lavish an epic as we may ever see.
January 07, 2014
The story is colorful and sometimes unpredictable, so it's rarely boring. But it's rarely much deeper than the emperor's favorite rice bowl.
January 07, 2014
Even though its ambitions sometimes get the better of it, the film succeeds often enough to make us grateful that, even in our MTV age, a director like Bertolucci is still willing to get on the mat and grapple with Personality and History.
January 07, 2014
One of the most visually arresting pictures of recent years.
February 21, 2015
One of the most provocative and stunningly beautiful films of the past 20 years.
January 07, 2014
At last a real, thought-provoking, eyeball-popping movie epic.
January 07, 2014
It is a hesitant, conservative approach that yields great elegance and a rhythm that carries the viewer along. Yet the film is haunted by a sense of opportunities not taken, of an artist deliberately reining in his artistry.
September 07, 2011
The expanse of time is saturated with an expanse of visual beauty that feels absolutely right for the story.
