Puyi was a participant in, and victim of, the tumultuous times through which he lived.
This film juxtaposes the major political events of the last Emperor of China's life with his strange domestic life, including his five 'wives'.
In 1908, aged only two, Puyi ascended the throne at the Forbidden City in Beijing as Qing Emperor of China. At six, rebellions forced his abdication but he continued to live at the palace surrounded by women and eunuchs.
At 13 he started to learn of the wider world from his British teacher Reginald Johnston (who was to be portrayed by Peter O'Toole in Bertolucci's famous feature film).
Soon afterwards Puyi was evicted from the Palace and embarked on an amazing personal quest to recover his throne.
He was to become a puppet Emperor controlled by the Japanese, a prisoner of the Soviet Union, an inmate of a Communist Chinese re-education camp and finally an ordinary citizen living in Beijing through the brutal upheavals of the Cultural Revolution.
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