The sweeping epic romance begins in 1929, near the end of the geishas' golden era. Told as a fable from a disappearing world, the film is set in a fictional hanamachi or geisha district.
As Sayuri (Zhang) enters this hidden world, she is taught that a geisha is not free to love, or to pursue her own destiny. Her mentor, the legendary geisha Mameha (Yeoh), understands the limits of an intimate relationship with a special patron or danna, and teaches Sayuri to keep her feelings tightly reined. Unlike Sayuri's defiant rival Hatsumomo (Gong), Mameha knows that a proper geisha cannot afford to indulge her passion for any man.
Yet Sayuri cannot forget a moment of unexpected kindness she experienced at an early age. The memory of that moment shimmers like a mirage, and sustains her through years of suffering. Looking back at her life, she remembers "a little girl with more courage than she knew," and reflects, "These are not the memoirs of an Empress, nor of a Queen. These are memoirs of another kind."
Rob Marshall savored the exotic world in which the story unfolds, but said he was just as taken by the universality of the young orphan's plight, and her eventual triumph after an accidental meeting changes the course of her life.
"This story lives in a very specific world, and yet the underlying theme of the triumph of the human spirit against all odds connects to any culture," said Marshall. "The fact that this one child, after being taken from her home and sold into slavery, can survive and ultimately find love is deeply moving to me. Especially when that love is forbidden to her."
Among the book's great strengths were Sayuri's keen observations as she encounters a world that she (along with most readers) had never even imagined. "We knew that capturing the essence of her interior monologue would be a challenge," said Fisher, "but it was also an opportunity. We were recounting the reminiscences of a woman whose life took an amazing turn when she was just nine years old. Much of what she shares is first seen through the eyes of a child, which gave us freedom to tell her story as more of a fable."
"Culturally, it was one of the most fascinating stories I had ever encountered," said Steven Spielberg. "I was very moved by the love story, by the rivalry between Sayuri and Hatsumomo, and by the test of friendship between the Chairman and Nobu. I thought audiences all over the world would be fascinated because it's not just culturally significant as legend or history from Japan. It's relevant to people in every country. It was certainly relevant to me."
Opening soon across the Philippines, "Memoirs of a Geisha" is distributed by Columbia Pictures, the local office of Sony Pictures Releasing International.