In The Geisha, a young woman in Japan at the beginning of the 20th century has to face major personal challenges. This is where she gets caught into a world where glory and danger await them in equal measure.
That’s what the historical drama on Netflix is about
In Japan in the 1920s, the girl Chiyo – later called Sayuri – is sold by her father to an okiya, a geisha house, in Kyoto after her mother’s death. After initial reluctance, Sayuri is introduced to the diverse arts of geishas and finds that success and defeat are close together. But Sayuri finds an ally in the respected geisha Mameha, who takes care of her.
In a world steeped in tradition, where every wrong step could be the last, Sayuri must assert herself in the game of intrigue.
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The geisha opens the gate to a bygone world
In his production, Rob Marshall (The Little Mermaid, Into the Woods) succeeds in letting the images speak through impressive backdrops and colorful costumes. Japan at the beginning of the 20th century can be there resurrected in all its beauty and horror before the eyes of the audience.
His cast is also impressive: whether Zhang Ziyi (House of Flying Daggers, The Cloverfield Paradox) blows an unfortunate dealer off his bike with a devoted look or does a choreography on stage – we are rooting for her.
Michelle Yeoh (Everything Everywhere All at Once, Wicked) as ally Mameha and Ken Watanabe (Last Samurai, The Creator) as the director also fill the breathtaking images with life and together develop an exciting dynamic.
Search for identity between times
The Geisha is based on the novel of the same name by the writer Arthur Golden. He, in turn, incorporated motifs from the life story of the geisha Mineko Iwasaki into his work. As in the original novel, the film sticks closely to the perspective of the protagonist Sayuri.
From their perspective, we are experiencing the last breaths of a dying world: the story intersects with the outbreak of the Second World War and thus also captures the prevailing fear and destruction.
Sayuri, caught between tradition and the desire for her personal happiness, tries to find her own path. Whether and how this succeeds remains exciting from the first to the last scene.
The Geisha premiered on December 9, 2005 and is available with a Netflix subscription.