Last Emperor-Love

In The Last Emperor, there is a scene in which Puyi, separated from his eunuch by a curtain, is touched through the fabric. The moment has elicited divergent interpretations. For some, it suggests a longing for intimacy—perhaps even a quoted ‘sex’—born from the untouchability imposed by imperial status; at the threshold of the curtain, someone is finally able to touch him. For others, it speaks more broadly to the desire for bodily closeness. Another reading sees a longing for love: surrounded by the loneliness and emotional distance of the palace, Puyi seeks a sustaining familial bond. Does he desire a relationship of kinship, or physical intimacy? Last Emperor: Sex and Love is a pair of garments shaped by this unresolved tension.