Fan Bingbing Shows Off Costumes in “The Empress of China”
The upcoming historical drama, The Empress of China <武則天>, which stars Fan Bingbing (范冰冰) as Tang Dynasty empress Wu Zetian, is scheduled to begin airing on Hunan Satellite TV near the end of December. Boasting a budget of 300 million RMB, The Empress of China aims to redefine the meaning of “beauty” with its stunning array of costume designs.
Helmed by Legend of Zhen Huan <後宮甄嬛傳> director Gao Yijun (高翊浚), The Empress of China reportedly features more than 1000 costumes for the entire cast. Leading lady Fan Bingbing alone goes through more than 260 costumes, many of them customized and hand-made. Even several of the supporting cast members have 30 to 50 outfits each.
Recently released promotional images of The Empress of China depicted Wu Zetian at various ages, ranging from 14 to 82, with each stage of life portrayed solely by Fan Bingbing. The costumes and visuals were so impressive that they even caught the attention of overseas media, and many Japanese netizens praised Bingbing for possessing an unearthly beauty.
The stills also showed off the eye-catching and unique outfits worn by other members of the cast, which includes actors Zhang Fengyi (張豐毅) and Aarif Lee (李治廷), as well as actresses Janine Chang (張鈞甯), Kathy Chow (周海媚), and Viann Zhang (張馨予).
Apart from the costumes, The Empress of China placed great importance on displaying accurate historical visuals. The crew went to great lengths to recreate the ancient capital of Chang’an, as well as the grand and imposing imperial palace of the Tang Dynasty. The majority of the scenes were filmed using a combination of real-location shoots and special effects. Moreover, the drama established a special warehouse for the design and creation of its many thousand props.
Source: Sohu.com
This article is written by Joanna for JayneStars.com.
Pretty costumes but show too much cleavages for ancient series.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daxiushan
Yes, but not this low with b**b popping out 🙂
” The clothing often, only cover half of women’s breast and so”
It specifies that it only covers half the breasts. Also, the trend in Tang Dynasty was for fleshy women, so they will have more curves than the skinny actresses we see on screen today.
I guess many have forgotten that one of the great beauties Yang Gui Fei was a bit meaty.
@Kathy,
Don’t judge the period costumes unless you’d read the history behind them.
PS: Then, Chinese women had much larger, erm, chests.
The wiki shown that the costume is correct, but I doubt back then you have that sort of push up bra >_> so yea, I agree with Kathy, that’s a bit too much cleavage >_>
Also, I’m a bit doubtful that back then chinese ladies are that big >_>
The costumes is not bad, but something about the hair make me dislike the look >_>
No,the standard for beauty back then was different. I guess you may not know that the great beauty Yang Gui fei was a bit plump and try considered that beautiful back then.
Meant to say they.
I know about one of the 4 great beauties is plump in figure. However, I’m saying its not common to have a lot of those, genetically and also, if you have so many, one of the great four would not be much stand out (her unique plump figure would not be so extraordinary). Also, most of these actress are not plump, they used super push up bra lol. Which indicates they are trying a bit hard, and trying to go for the cleavages showing direction more than trying to be historical accurate :p
Tang Dynasty women supposedly flaunted their cleavage. I think Curse of the Golden Flowers is supposed to be Tang Dynasty period movie and just look at Gong Li bursting through her costume with her booobs almost popping out the low neckline.
Curse of GF really over exaggerated cleavages in that film. Thank god it wasn’t in 3D. I read that it was Zhang Yimou’s dumb idea to recreate bosoms like those of French court ladies.
The top picture looks very geisha-like. Not sure how historical-accurate the costumes and makeup are though.
well, tang dynasty women did have very sexy clothing which revealed their cleavages. i wouldn’t say this geisha-like.
@Heather,
Wrong.
The traditional Japanese female dress was, in fact “inspired” by (rip-off) the Tang Dynasty. Feel free to read this up.
Japanese were greatly influenced by ancient Chinese style and fashion and practically cloned Tang culture during 800AD. It was Japanese who copied the hairdos as seen on ‘fat’ lady sculptures of Tang dynasty,
the japanese were inspired by the costume of the Tang dynasty! just recently learned that in class lol
The costumes are pretty but the hair styles look ridiculous. Too much make-up!!!
It’s historically accurate though. They wrote even more make up back then! Just look up of depictions how they did their brows.
Why can’t we strike a balance between historically accurate and looking good, because ATM, I’m with nori, the hair and make up are a bit too much for my liking
Man, TVB is thinking of airing this during a prime time slot :/
Will it be dubbed? =( I still prefer HK shows altho some of them are pretty boring lol
I’m pretty sure it will be, but honestly TVB’s dubbing is horrible
TVB’s basically brain dead when it comes to what the HK public wants. Haven’t taken any lessons from how Journey to the West sunk badly last time.
Was Journey to the West a major flop? I haven’t seen this drama at all…
As far as ratings were concerned, Journey to the West did not do any worse than any TVB drama at the time. But then, TVB did not have to pay big buck (like in here) to buy the right since it was an old show.
Not appropriate to China culture. If this is Tang ‘s and if the history is right that Tang culture is related to Turks or Persians or XiongNu, then this film has to performs this culture.
Maybe FBB face is related to this ethnic..
Don’t know where you got your historical facts from but the Turks/Persians had nothing to do with the Tang Dynasty, other than getting their khanate subdued or invaded. In fact, at one point, they & other foreigners were widely massacred during the decline of the Tang Dynasty.
Chinese culture is no where similar to Turks or Persians culture so where did you even get the idea of Turks or Persians related to Tang culture.
If the Tang Dynasty was culturally related with the Turks or Xiongnu, then the Tang would be riding on horses, living in tents, and raiding villages as how those nomads once did. They wouldn’t have been using Chinese characters either.
Seriously, even Li Yuan, the founder of the Tang Dynasty, traced his (at least his paternal) ancestry to the state of Western Liang, which is of Chinese stock. Some say his mother was Xianbei, but that’s besides the point.
Before he was an emperor of the Tang Dynasty, he was a governor of the Sui Dynasty and one of his main jobs was to “pacify” the Turks (Gokturks) bordering in his region. In fact, his Tang Dynasty eventually was the one who destroyed the Gokturks. Does that really sound like the Tang were of the same kind as the Turks?
The Tang Dynasty was also very open to foreign ideas and arts. For example, they allowed Christianity and Zoroastrianism (this is probably where you confused Tang with the Persian culture?) back then, but not culturally infused.
Viann Zhang’s hair in that pic… how do they even keep their head up… she has 3 dramas airing at the same time
Kathy Chow looks beautiful!!
Agree. For same reason she looks a lot prettier in China drama than hk drama.
She looks amazing I nearly can’t recognise her
Kathy is always pretty if she doesn’t speak lol. Don’t get me wrong I like her, but when her teeth is revealed, she turns not so pretty :/
“Apart from the costumes, The Empress of China placed great importance on displaying accurate historical visuals.”
I hope they also put equal importance on the script. I wonder if the script will try to make the framing and torture of Empress Wang under the scheme of Wu Zetian justified.
Watched the trailer and the quality seems impressive. They didn’t reveal much of the plot so can’t comment anything on the script.
Daaaang, that headdress is HUGE! Their necks are going to be sore after this drama! >_<
not as clunky as those massive Korean butterfly hairdos, or the over-the-top soaring hairdos of French court ladies.
The costumes are super pretty!
All I’m seeing in one of the trailers (only see one btw) is that FBB has way too much make up on, and some looks so bad, extremely bad. On other trailer, she looks ok, but not attracting me or screaming pretty to me, I haven’t found her pretty for a long time now, don’t know why. The trailer don’t seem interesting, and aarif lee has such a wrong face for ancient series, pass lol
Whoa…beautiful costumes. The hairstyles aren’t too bad. I’m not too keen about FBB’s acting, so we shall see.
Is that Zhang Ting in the last still? What role is she playing?
Yes, that is Zhang Ting. She played Consort Wei (韋貴妃).
Ah, I see. Haven’t seen her in a while. I guess she’s relegated to supporting roles.
Plus she is now a mother of 2,so probably took so,e time off and is now making a comeback.
Meant to say some.
She is one of Emperor Taizong’s (Li Shimin)’s major concubines.
I remembered an old version played by Fung Bo Bo. She was beautiful and excellent in it. But it was ages ago maybe close to 25 years or more but she played the role very well.
Costumes nice but the hair is just plain ridiculous.
those costumes looks okay…but the hair style is just ridiculous!!!
Anything with FBB is just super OTT. She’s unearthly alright – pale as a ghost and looks like an alien.
I can’t stand her. She’s just too vain.
Agree. Super plastic. Go and watch My Fair Princess with Vicky Zhao, FBB was nothing close to good looking. Can’t stand how she thinks she is so beautiful now. It’s all plastic.
Haha! I liked her when she was a supporting actress. I never understood the hype about FBB. She’s far from Vicky or Ruby in terms of success. Acting wise? She had potential, but now it seemed like it’s all about posing/looking good in front of the cameras.
You call this heavy makeup? Have you not seen Hollywood productions?
Pls stop criticising what you personally cannot achieve. Actresses wear makeup, they get called a cake face. They have a few pimples showing, they are criticised for not taking care of their skin. If your not a fan of the wardrobe then don’t watch the movie. I think this production will come out great! If you have not read or researched on Chinese history then pls do not comment on the clothing. Chinese women were known to be bustier than whats popular now days. Pls do some research before posting foolish comments.
huh??? what are you even talking about????? in hollywood production, actors put on the right amount of makeup. its not over done like mainland dramas.
I think the costumes look nice but the hair and make up are a bit over the top. However,those are just minor details. Let’s hope the story and script are good and historically accurate. Heard TVB spend like over 300 million HKD to purchase the rights to air this production. How sad that they cannot spend more money to make their productions better. Strange..
Totally agree. If TVB spend HKD300 million to produce their own drama series instead of purchasing the rights to air this production, they will have a good drama series to show their own audience as well as selling it to other countries.
More than ten years ago, when TVB purchased the air right to Kdrama Jewel in the Palace (Dae Jeung Geung), many had called that as a suicidal move. Well,it turns out that Jewel became the highest rated drama in HK TV history. No other locally produced show even came close. TVB was laughing all the way to the bank as it could price gouge time spot fees to advertisers during the show’s run.
So, the question now should be can lightning strike twice? Especially for the price tag now has made this a high-stake game.
In terms of money wise (advertising income), you may be right. However, they lost the pride of producing a good and highest-rated drama series to other countries.
Well, if you look at it from that angle, that pride has long been lost in the film industry.
For some time now, films with high box-office gross in HK tend to be Hollywood imports at the expense of Chinese-language movies.
Love love love Fan Bingbing
Those clevages looked weird…
Hope it will be a great series with a good plot! The theme song sound great– didn’t know Aarif Lee is such a talented musician as well. Recently found his music and he wrote a lot of songs! Good luck to Aarif on his film and music career. He is pretty cute too!