Edward Norton, Naomi Watts, Toby Jones, Anthony Wong Chau Sang and Liev Schreiber appear in the leading roles.
When Walter finds out, he threatens divorce for adultery unless she accompanies him to a village in a remote area of China where he has volunteered to treat victims of an unchecked cholera epidemic.
The couple embark upon an arduous, two-week-long overland journey to the mountainous inland region, which is considerably faster and much easier if they traveled by river, but Walter is determined to make Kitty as uncomfortable as possible.
Their cheerful neighbor Waddington is a British deputy commissioner living in relative opulence with Wan Xi, a young Chinese woman.
"[5]He suggested casting Naomi Watts for the role of Kitty, but this decision did not take place until after she proved herself a bankable star with her performances in Mulholland Drive (2001) and 21 Grams (2003).
"[4] Norton considered The Painted Veil to be in the spirit of such films as Out of Africa (1985) and The English Patient (1996), seeing it as "rooted in really looking at the way that men and women hurt each other".
To detail scenes from the time period, Curran, Norton, and Nyswaner relied on excerpts from historian Jonathan Spence's 1969 book To Change China, which covered the inept efforts of Western advisers during these years.
He came across the old quarter of Huangyao (黄姚古镇, huángyáo gǔzhèn) in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, which then served as the location for the village scenes.
All of them are performed by the Choir of the Beijing Takahashi Culture and Art Centre:[8] The film's post-production schedule was slated to conclude in late summer 2006, but did not finish until November.
According to Laura Kim, the marketing and publicity head of Warner Independent Pictures, the delay slowed award and media recognition for the film.
Film critic Rex Reed of The New York Observer wrote, "Nobody can understand why Warner Independent Pictures is keeping this movie such a secret; it is filled with Oscar possibilities that should be shouted from the rooftops.
"[6] The firing of Mark Gill, one of the initial producers of The Painted Veil and who brought it to Warner Independent Pictures, was cited as a reason for the small scale of the film's marketing campaign.
Warner Independent hosted 80 screenings of The Painted Veil in Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, and London as well as to various Hollywood guilds, to promote the film.
The website's consensus reads: "Visually, The Painted Veil has all the trappings of a stuffy period drama, but Norton and Watts's deft portrayals of imperfect, complicated characters give the film a modern-day spark.
Instead, as nicely directed by John Curran and adapted to the screen by Ron Nyswaner, this version of the story lulls you by turning Maugham's distaff bildungsroman into a fine romance.
Even better, the new film gives us ample opportunity to spend time with Ms. Watts, whose remarkable talent helps keep movie faith and love alive, even in the tinniest, tiniest vehicles .
An inveterate stealer and masticator of scenes, Mr. Norton is very fine here, especially early on, before his billing gets the better of the story and he begins riding around heroically on horseback .
"[12]Carina Chocano of the Los Angeles Times wrote the film "has all the elements in place to be a great epic, but it fails to connect, to paraphrase Maugham's contemporary E.M. Forster, the prose with the passion.
"[13] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone rated the film three out of four stars and commented "If you're suspecting this third movie version of W. Somerset Maugham's 1925 novel may carry the infectious dullness of prestige filmmaking, rest easy...the film is a period piece propelled by emotions accessible to a modern audience...The Painted Veil has the power and intimacy of a timeless love story.
"[14]Meghan Keane of The New York Sun wrote the film "may at times threaten to fall into an abyss of sentimentality, and it has moments that seem mere transitions to propel the plot, but it manages a charming historic portrait without insulting the audience's intelligence.
"[15] Todd McCarthy of Variety thought the story "feels remote and old-school despite a frankness the two previous film versions lacked."
Despite the extremes of human experience on view, there is a certain blandness to them as they play out, a sensation matched by the eye-catching but picture-postcard-like presentation of the settings...Even the ultra-capable Norton and Watts aren't fully able to galvanize viewer interest in their narrowly self-absorbed characters.
[17] Desplat also won an award for Best Original Score from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association for both The Painted Veil and The Queen (2006).
[22] In 2024, while promoting Feud: Capote vs. the Swans, Naomi Watts was asked to name her most underrated film and chose The Painted Veil, saying "I thought it was a really lovely film—that nobody saw.