This was another great movie by director Zhang Yimou.  

This film is based in 1930's gangster underworld, and spans 7 days.

  

It is centered around the life of a young man, 14 yr old Shuisheng, who just recently moved to Shanghai from the country to get a job with his uncle.  Little did he know what he was getting into.  On his first day, he witnesses a murder over an opium delivery.  His uncle works for the major crime boss of Shanghai, "Boss" Tang.  "Boss" has a mistress, Jinbao,  who is now Shuisheng's duty to wait upon, as he is now her personal servant.  Wherever she goes, he goes.

Mistress is having an affair with Boss' right-hand man, Song.  It ends abruptly, the night before Boss and his men are attacked by Boss' rival, Fat Yu.  Among the men killed by Fat Yu's men, are Shuiseng's uncle, Liu.  Boss was stabbed during the battle.  

The next night, Boss and a few of his men, including Mistress and Shuisheng, are brought to a remote island where they can hide, and Boss can recuperate from his injuries.  There are only 2 other people living on the island.

Mistress befriends the peasant woman who lives on the island with her 9 yr old daughter, Ajiao.  Every time someone sees the child, they comment on how beautiful she is, and how she looks like Mistress when she was young.  Mistress unwittingly butts into the peasant Cuihao's life, mostly out of boredom, and causes destruction.  One night, she wonders over to Cuihao's hut, and sees her in bed with a man who had snuck onto the island at night to be with her.  When she jokes about it to Boss, he has his men kill the man, because his orders were that no one enters or leaves the island without his permission.  He blames Mistress for the death when she confronts him about it.

By the 7th day of Shuisheng's adventures in Shanghai, he witnesses a mahjong game between Boss, Mistress, Zheng (bosses other man), and Song.  Boss admits to having known the entire time that Song was working for Fat Yu, and having an affair with Mistress.  He has had  Song followed, and planned this night for months.  He admits he was never actually wounded.

Boss kills Song, and tells Mistress he is going to kill her, too.  She asks him to leave the little girl Ajiao alone, and he tells her no.  He plans on killing her mother, and bringing the little girl to Shanghai to raise as the next Mistress.

When Shuisheng tries to stop him, he gets strung upside down on the boat, and the last scene is of the little girl telling Boss that she wants to be just like Mistress.  It was sad that the whole cycle would repeat itself.

One thing I did not like about this movie (and Raise the Red Lantern) is that it's the men who put the women in horrible situations, but it's the women who get blamed for the horrible things that happen.