Red Sorghum

Red Sorghum, Zhang Yimou’s 1988 directorial debut, unfolds in a secluded Chinese village where an elderly leper’s death leaves his sorghum winery to Jiu’er, his wife, and her lover, the narrator’s grandfather. Jiu’er’s defiant leadership fosters a matriarchal enclave, a sanctuary of resistance against the encroaching Japanese forces. When the invaders ravage the land, cutting down the sorghum to build a road, the community’s resilience is tested as they rise to defend their crops and their way of life, a defiant act that symbolizes the indomitable spirit of the oppressed.