All that glitters is gold after all

His new film, in which Gong Li acts for him for the first time since their break-up, won't cause much trouble for him either. It is even more spectacular than the last two, equipped with so much luxurious décor and so many hundreds of extras that even the makers of Hollywood's old Biblical epics might catch their breath in envy.

Unfortunately, this story of duplicity and treasonable goings-on during the Tang Dynasty is so over-egged that the good story that lies some way beneath the spectacle often gets stymied. Someone has already described it as The House of the Dying Naggers and, under the circumstances, the joke sticks. To think that this man made the superb Raise the Red Lantern.

Gong Li, now not as young as when we first fell in love with her on the screen, but still beautiful and well aware of it, plays the Queen to superstar Chow Yun-Fat's King. She's clearly up to no good, plotting with her sons to take over the throne.

Accordingly the King, wise to her plans without knowing which son is going to seize power, is slowly poisoning her with a special medicine he forces her to take twice a day.

Meanwhile hundreds of servants, augmented by dozens of young lovelies whose breasts are pushed upwards in low-cut costumes to look as sexy as the Chinese cinema allows, minister to the royals as if nothing untoward is happening.

Gradually, however, each royal discovers the details of the other's plotting and a huge battle ensues within and without the palace. Vast armies, displayed in serried rows and tramping towards the enemy as if on the parade ground, cut each other down. And since this is the time of the Chrysanthemum Festival, thousands of flowers are first trampled under foot and then instantly replaced with another lot to cover up the bloody mess.

I will not tell you which side wins. Suffice to say that Gong Li tries hard, and often successfully, to suggest an Eastern version of Joan Crawford, while the King and his sons grimace less convincingly as the plot thickens and the scenery gets thoroughly chewed.

But what scenery, and what costumes! Production designer Huo Tingxiao and costume designer Yee Chung Man are given translucent gold-tinted lighting to make their work look more ornate.

You feel you need to bathe your eyes after watching Curse of the Golden Flower, in case they are swollen with sheer astonishment. It might also be handy to bathe the brain, too: despite, or possibly because of its magnificent façade, the film's interior is decidedly bare.

Less spectacle and more characterisation might have given this last of Zhang's wushu trilogy a heart and a mind to vie with his early work. As it is, The Curse of the Golden Flower is cursed with melodramatic over-emphasis that supplies diminishing returns.

Curse Of The Golden Flower
Cert: 15