Film· 2005· Drama

Memoirs of a Geisha

by Rob Marshall

Memoirs of a Geisha: it draws on 1 recorded source.

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What influenced Memoirs of a Geisha

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Memoirs of a Geisha

Book · 1997

AdaptationHIGH

Rob Marshall's film of Arthur Golden's novel, produced by Spielberg, who had been attached to direct. Faithful in plot: Chiyo sold to an okiya, the rivalry with Hatsumomo, Mameha's tutelage, the mizuage, the Chairman. The novel's own sourcing is contested and that belongs on the record. Mineko Iwasaki, the retired geiko Golden interviewed, sued him for breach of confidence after he named her in the acknowledgements, and later wrote her own account to correct his. The film inherits her objections along with the story.

About the work

Memoirs of a Geisha

It tells the story of a young Japanese girl, Chiyo Sakamoto, who is sold by her impoverished family to a geisha house to support them by training as and eventually becoming a geisha under the pseudonym "Sayuri Nitta". The film centers around the sacrifices and hardship faced by pre-World War II geisha, and the challenges posed to geisha society by the war and a modernizing world. It stars Zhang Ziyi in the lead role, with Michelle Yeoh, Gong Li, Youki Kudoh, Suzuka Ohgo, Samantha Futerman and Ken Watanabe.