M. Butterfly (1993) on Netflix
R19931h 41mDramaHistoryRomance
In 1964 Beijing, French embassy accountant René Gallimard falls for the opera singer Song Liling, though she is not all she seems. He is put in charge of the embassy's intelligence work.
- Netflix3.4/5
- IMDb6.7/1011,876 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes39%
Trailer
Plot summary
In 1964 René Gallimard is an accountant at the French Embassy in Beijing, where his wife lives with him. Frau Baden, an embassy wife, brings him to a program of excerpts from Madama Butterfly, an opera he does not know, and the singer Song Liling holds his attention. When they speak afterward, Song faults his fondness for the opera's orientalist picture of the East and presses him to widen his knowledge by going to a staging of Peking Opera, the form she performs. He goes, meets her backstage, and walks her home. Then he keeps away for a time. At the embassy his exacting manner wins him no friends, yet the ambassador names him vice-consul to reorganize how intelligence is gathered, as American involvement in Vietnam grows. He calls on Song once more.
Cast
- Antony Parras Intelligence Officer #3
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about M. Butterfly (1993)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- When M. Butterfly opened the 1993 Toronto International Film Festival on September 9, Cronenberg became the first director to have two of their films shown as the festival’s opening film, after Dead Ringers opened it in 1988.
SPOILER
Cronenberg had parts of the script, such as the Americans in Vietnam and the bombing scenes, removed because they did not interest him, and he created the ending scene between Gallimard and Liling in the police van himself, feeling that Liling being allowed into Gallimard’s cell and stripping, as in the play, would be unbelievable.- The story is loosely based on true events which involved the French diplomat Bernard Boursicot and the Chinese opera singer Shi Pei Pu.
- Casting the role of Liling took some searching: Cronenberg auditioned over sixty men for the part before he selected John Lone.
