Velvet Shanghai

Epic in scale, "Velvet Shanghai" tells the story of Tanfeng, a sensational Shanghai movie star, and her romantic and entangled relationships with several prominent men, especially her ambivalent, Western-educated director (Richard Yang) and a young, rising Communist leader (Kao Yüan) through the many historical changes including the Sino-Japanese War that rocked China from 1925 through 1945. Tanfeng lived a privileged but motherless life with servants and a nanny and rose to stardom with the help of Fengtse, Galaxy Film Studio's owner and director, who was infatuated with her. She fell in love with Richard, a rich and handsome Ph.D. returning from America, and pursued him relentlessly, ignoring the attentions of Yüan, a worker's son. Yüan went to Japan and eventually became a successful screenwriter and underground resistance leader in Shanghai. Upon learning of Richard's marriage to another woman, Tanfeng hastily entered into a loveless marriage with one of her costars. Everything changed when the Sino-Japanese War broke out. Galaxy Studio disbanded following the deaths of Fengtse and his wife. Yüan went to the front lines after having worked with Tanfeng and Richard on several films. Tanning then realized that she also loved Yüan. Tanfeng and Richard's traveling drama troupe suffered many ordeals in the dangerous hinterlands, where their romance began to bloom. After they returned to Shanghai they had to flee again when the Japanese tried to coerce them to take a propaganda tour of Japan. After the Japanese surrendered, Tanfeng and Richard returned to Shanghai. As Richard's plane is about to take off for America, Tanfeng must choose between him and Yüan...In a perilous time and a decadent world inhabited by communists and imperialists, feudal lords and gang leaders, goddesses and courtesans, international spies and counter-spies, "Velvet Shanghai"i is filled with complex and conflicted characters and lots of dramatic action.