Book and Film Review: Memoirs of a Geisha

   (Disclaimer: I do not mean to offend people with this post of mine, especially the Japanese reader of this blog. Since this blog is mainly about Japanese culture, and my experiences. I just want to share the book and the film that I have seen. The book is classified as non-fiction, so it is not really a true account or story. )

This is one of the first Western (Hollywood) movie that has  Japanese theme. From the title alone you have an idea already. It stars top Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi, and a Japanese actor named Ken Watanabe. I have seen the movie twice, and as you can see from the photo I also own the book. According to Wikipedia, the film was produce by Steven Spielberg. I love the cinematography (a few scenes were shot in Japan), and also the story line, if you are into drama and romance genre. The movie is about a geisha's personal life, before and after World War II.

According to my research there is a lot of controversy with regards to the showing of this movie in some countries like China where it was banned, there's also a controversy with regards to the author of this movie, Arthur Golden, and the one that he interviewed as a resource person for his book, a retired geisha by the name of Mineko Iwasaki. I doubt if this book has given justice to what a geisha is, because it portrays the life of a geisha in a different way, and kinda scandalous way. True to life movies, I noticed, the story is not that faithful to the original, also this is what you expect from Hollywood movies. It is better that you get a non-fiction book about geishas, don't based their real life in this book/movie,