Woman Sesame Oil Maker

Woman Sesame Oil Maker
Film poster
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese香魂女
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinXiāng hún nǚ
Directed byXie Fei
Written byXie Fei
Story byZhou Daxin
StarringSiqin Gaowa
CinematographyBao Xiaoran
Music byWang Liping
Distributed byFacets Multimedia (Region 1 DVD)
Release dates
  • 1993 (1993) (China)
  • February 16, 1994 (1994-02-16) (New York City)
Running time
105 minutes
CountryChina
LanguageMandarin

Woman Sesame Oil Maker (Chinese: 香魂女; pinyin: Xiāng hún nǚ) is a 1993 Chinese film. In the English speaking world it has been released in the United Kingdom under the title Women from the Lake of Scented Souls (the more literal translation) and more recently on DVD as Woman Sesame Oil Maker. It is adapted from a novel by Zhou Daxin, "The Fragrant Oil Mill by the Lake of Scented Souls" (香魂塘畔的香油坊).

The film is adapted and directed by Xie Fei and tells the story of a woman in a small village in Hebei who runs a small sesame oil business that becomes unexpectedly successful, but who then uses her money to buy for her mentally disabled son a peasant bride.

The film won the Golden Bear for Best Film at the 43rd Berlin International Film Festival in 1993, a prize it shared with Ang Lee's The Wedding Banquet.