The Red Detachment of Women (1961)

Original title

红色娘子军

Directed by

Xie Jin

Genre

drama film, war film

Country

People's Republic of China

Runtime

1h 50m

Rating

6.6 of 10 from 9 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

Two peasant women in 1930s China decide to fight in a war. They face hardships and join others in revolutionary struggle.

inspiringheroicearnestgrittydeterminedhistoricaldramaticrousing

What happens

The Red Detachment of Women (Chinese: 红色娘子军; pinyin: Hóngsè Niángzi Jūn) is a 1961 Chinese film by Xie Jin based on a script by Liang Xin. It is set in the 1930s and involves two peasant women who go into warfare. The cast includes Zhu Xijuan, Wang Xingang, Xiang Mei, Jin Naihua, Chen Qiang, and Niu Ben. The Red Detachment of Women became famous after winning the PRC's best script, best director, and best actress awards in November 1961. The film characters of Qiong Hua, Hong Changqing, and Nan Batian became quite well-known and following the success of the Red Detachment of Women ballet in 1964 by the end of 1966 was elevated to one of the eight "revolutionary model theatrical works" (geming yangbanxi, or yangbanxi for short), which formed the official canon. A film of the ballet was released in 1970. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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