In the aftermath, Gu walks through the carnage laughing at the ingenuity of his plan until the true cost of human life dawns upon him. Having… Be the first to contribute! Gina Marchetti considers that the genre of the film as wuxia is a new emergence in the Hong Kong New Wave and writes, “although produced in Taiwan after Hu had left Hong Kong, the international accolades for this film brought the “new” cinema of Hong Kong much greater visibility, while providing an art house alternative to the enormous international popularity of Bruce Lee”[24]. [38][39], "A Touch of Zen: Prowling, Scheming, Flying", "[最佳華語片一百部] The Best 100 Chinese Motion Pictures(in Chinese)", "A Touch of Zen : DVD Talk Review of the DVD Video", "A Touch Of Zen (Xia Nu) 1971 [DVD] [1969]", "My movie poster for @Criterion's release of A TOUCH OF ZEN is here! One night, investigating strange noises, he meets the beautiful Yang who is living there. However, the film modifies the character’s attributes and instead leads the scholar to adapt knight-errant and restore the country from the corrupted dominance of the eunuchs. A Touch of Zen 1970 ★★ Watched Jul 21, 2020. [31]The voters included film scholars, festival programmers, film directors, actors and producers to vote for the 100 Greatest Chinese-Language Films. A lady fugitive on the run from corrupt government officials is joined in her endeavors by an unambitious painter and skilled Buddhist monks. Gradually, it is revealed that his attractive new neighbour, Yang Huizen, is a powerful female warrior and fugitive from the corrupt eunuch ruling class. [6], Hu based the screenplay of A Touch of Zen on the ghost story of Xia Nü in Liaozhai Zhiyi, an anthology by Pu Songling. | 100-101. Just click the "Edit page" button at the bottom of the page or learn more in the Synopsis submission guide. , the story is largely seen through the eyes of Gu, a well-meaning but unambitious scholar and painter, with a tendency towards being clumsy and ineffectual. - And the whole Zen part definitely comes into play at the end as the main monk is wounded and begins bleeding gold, and then takes a seat on a hilltop in front of the sun to become this image of a seemingly enlightened Buddha figure . Ku finds himself caught up in her struggle to survive, and many fierce battles take place before all is resolved. “The glimpsing effect” allows the audience to see the perspective of Gu. Upon doing so, he is no longer the naïve bumbling innocent, but instead becomes confident and assertive, and when Yang's plight is revealed, he insists on being part of it – and even comes up with a fiendish "Ghost Trap" for the East Chamber guards. An amazing mirror of content and form here. He is an artist who has studied for knowledge and is content with what he has since he and his mother have everything they need. His daughter fled, and Abbot Hui intervened to protect them. In November 1971, both parts of the film were combined into one for the Hong Kong market with a run time of 187 minutes. 1 and 2). Broadly speaking martial arts films – even wuxia narratives – occur in one of three worlds, either in the everyday ordinary world of a given time and place, in a blood drenched world of warriors possessed of bone breaking fighting skills or a mystical world of flying swordsmen so puissant at arms that battle is a form of transcendence. Hello, the 2001 of Sinophone cinema. | The first part of the movie is entirely concentrated on capturing the magnificent power of the Taiwanese scenery through a variety of camera movement techniques. A Touch of Zen (1971) is the kind of gargantuan production that only an artist high on newfound freedoms would dream of making. Same price for any type of massage. A lady fugitive on the run from corrupt government officials is joined in her endeavors by an unambitious painter and skilled Buddhist monks. Review Date July 26th, 2016 by Daniel Lee. 1971 NR 3h 5m Blu-ray / DVD ... Hsu Feng as Yang, the daughter of a government official whose entire family is murdered when her father uncovers a plot to overthrow the emperor. The film famously ends with the injured Yang staggering toward a silhouetted figure, presumably Abbot Hui, seen meditating with the setting sun forming a halo around his head, an image suggesting the Buddha and enlightenment. Vaguely, A TOUCH OF ZEN is a martial arts film, and it's greatest influence was on other HK martial arts films (and later international crossovers like CROUCHING TIGER, HERO and HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS). Submitted by Adrian McCabe on 23/01/2002 20:01 A film that I only once some 20 years ago on television but which I hold to be one of the greatest films ever made if that makes any sense. At the 1975 Cannes Film Festival, the film won the Technical Grand Prize award. No Shaw film would have delayed the basic exposition so cunningly. Just that sense of scale! With a shorter run time and tighter story, I would have likely enjoyed A Touch of Zen a lot more. Add Lawrence of Arabia and LOTR to it too. The fugitive, Yang, is befriended by Gu, and together they plot against the corrupt Eunuch Wei who wants to eradicat… After the popular success of Bruce Lee's “chop–socky” kung–fu films, as Variety called them, A Touch of Zen was acclaimed by critics as “martial arts ballet.” Its exhilarating action choreography, stylish camerawork, and metaphysical resonance opened Western … Yet A Touch of Zen's last third is where King Hu shows his true ambitions and where the film rises above genre. The film was produced in Taiwan and funded by the Union Film Company. Union Film, a Taiwanese start-up studio, welcomed him just a few years into his directing time with Shaw. [30] A Touch of Zen was listed at 9th place on the list. The new Blu-ray and DVD cover and interior poster (combined with the leaflet) was illustrated by Greg Ruth and designed by Eric Skillman. Author David Bordwell writes on The Criterion Collection, “The story is simple, but the treatment is complex. Sublime and sprawling, A TOUCH OF ZEN is perhaps the greatest in King Hu's series of ground-breaking, metaphysical period dramas. A Touch of Zen ( Xia nu) by King Hu depicts the journey of Yang, a fugitive noblewoman in disguise who seeks refuge in a remote, and allegedly haunted, village. The second hour is sublime, then the third is just... transcendent. A three-hour production with a richly woven plot, structural complexity, and dazzling visual experimentation, A Touch of Zen is the director’s grandest vision. From a feminist perspective, she also has the initiative to end her relationship with Gu and reject the feudalistic values of women’s obligation to men. After the battle, Gu is unable to find Yang, who he is told has left him and does not want him to follow her. Yet by building the plot around Gu, Hu creates a protagonist-as-witness.”[25]. A stranger arrives in town wanting his portrait painted by Gu, but his real objective is to bring a female fugitive back to the city for execution on behalf of the East Chamberguards. [20], A Touch of Zen went through a box-office failure when it was released in two installments in Taiwan in 1970 and 1971. [22] It was not until the full three-hour version was revived for a screening at the 1975 Cannes Film Festival did A Touch of Zen gain wide attention.[23]. Vaguely, A TOUCH OF ZEN is a martial arts film, and it's greatest influence was on other HK martial arts films (and later international crossovers like CROUCHING TIGER, HERO and HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS). [31], A Touch of Zen was released on DVD for the North American market on December 10, 2002 by Tai Seng Entertainment, with only King Hu's biography and filmography as extras. She is being pursued by agents of an Imperial noble who have murdered her family. Because the director Hu was a filmmaker in the Shaw Brothers Studio before moving to Taiwan, the emergence of the film established the international visibility of the Hong Kong New Wave. Ku Shen Chai (Chun Shih), an unmotivated artist in his early 30s, still lives with his mother, but he is shaken from his comfortable rut by the arrival of beautiful and mysterious Yang Hui-ching (Feng Hsu), a princess on the run from Gen. Ou-Yang … [16], The film presents Xia Nü Yang in the paradoxical image of female roles. A Touch of Zen seeks no compromise: it is not only a truly entertaining piece of filmmaking on a technical and storytelling level, but it’s equally loaded with symbolism and invites the viewer for interpretation. I love the "external witness unwillingly becomes part of a larger story" frame that kick-starts the plot, as well as the kind of underlying feminist theme. Its screenplay is based on a classic Chinese story Xiannü in the book Liaozhaizhiyi by Pu Songling. The movie begins by establishing a number of shots of the mesmerizing, mountainous landscapes near a small rural village in Ming China. She tells Gu that their destiny together has ended and gives Gu their child. The film then briefly uses split-screen with six separate views to show the spread of these rumors. [7] He arranged the credit of Liaozhai Zhiyi as the first title card right after the company logo in the film, even before the film title. And no Shaw film would have presented heroic swordplay through the eyes of a secondary character. A Touch of Zen Storyline. A Touch of Zen is the leading supplier in Martial arts and MMA gear, Weapons, cases, books, dvd's, Ninjutsu training gear, Holistic items, spiritual and meditative products. [a], the story is largely seen through the eyes of Gu, a well-meaning but unambitious scholar and painter, with a tendency towards being clumsy and ineffectual. Taglines He first spreads rumors of ghosts, with his mother playing a part. She delivers a son to continue Gu’s family line as a traditional mother and help fulfill Gu’s filial piety, revealing the dominance of patriarchy in society. [35][36], After the film's 4K restoration in 2015, the film's first Blu-ray release was by Eureka Entertainment for the Masters of Cinema series, released on January 25, 2016 for the British market, which also includes a DVD edition of the film. An artist, Ku, lives with his mother near an abandoned fort, reputed to be haunted. 60 min ------- $80 90 min ------- $110 120 min ----- $140. Plot Keywords [3][4] In his book on the film, Stephen Teo suggested that the film suggested the film's roots in Hong Kong cinema, noting the bulk of both Taiwanese and Hong Kong actors and crew members. An artist, Ku, lives with his mother near an abandoned fort, reputed to be haunted. He lives with his nagging mother in a supposedly haunted, rundown house at the edge of the abandoned Ching Liu estate. He tracks her down at the monastery of the saintly and powerful Abbot Hui Yuan, where she has given birth to a child by Gu and become a nun. The original Taiwanese release was in two parts in 1970 and 1971 (filming was still ongoing when the first part was released) with the bamboo forest sequence that concludes Part 1 reprised at the beginning of Part 2; this version has a combined run time of 200 minutes. Taglines; Plot Summary; Synopsis; Plot Keywords; Parents Guide Hu explained proudly of the trial and error he went through in the creative process and concluded that he had put together many scenes in less than eight frames challenging the “golden rule” of cinema. A Touch of Zen by King Hu depicts the journey of Yang (Hsu Feng), a fugitive noblewoman who seeks refuge in a remote, and allegedly haunted, village. 172-173. She is being pursued by agents of an Imperial noble who have murdered her family. The subject of Buddhist transcendence is Hu’s way of delivering the ultimate critique of the genre’s raison d’être which is the audience’s wish-fulfilment for heroes to save them from their own vulnerability.”[27], "Wei Yi criticizes that the film part 1 and part 2 do not add up as a whole film because of the stiff tail section. Much less compact and tightly structured than the previous Dragon Inn, A Touch of Zen mostly felt like a feature aimed to an international audience but that also winks to the national, mostly conservatory, Chinese audience. A Touch of Zen is aware that it's telling a story; The subtle exaggeration that lies within every frame gives the film a mythic quality, as if it is a legend that has grown in it's scale over centuries of time before finally reaching the screen. The film only ran one week in the cinema and faced the failure because of its undesired themes of ambiguous sexuality and feminist sensibility. ", Interview with King Hu on the making of A Touch of Zen, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=A_Touch_of_Zen&oldid=1014712143, Films based on Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles containing traditional Chinese-language text, Articles containing Chinese-language text, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, Han Ying-jie as Chief Commander Xu Xian-chun, Jia Lushi as Yang Lian, the protagonist Yang's father, This page was last edited on 28 March 2021, at 17:57. A Touch of Zen is a 1971 wuxia film co-edited, written, and directed by King Hu. Both editions include a select scene commentary by critic Tony Rayns, the film's theatrical trailer, and newly translated English subtitles, as well as a 36-page booklet which features director King Hu's statement from the 1975 Cannes Film Festival, a 1975 interview with the director by Rayns, the short story the film was based on, eight characteristics of "the swordswoman" in King Hu's films, and archival images. Teo, King Hu’s A Touch of Zen, pp. One of the unique aspects of the film is that Gu is a non-combatant all the way through the film and only becomes involved when he sleeps with Yang. Hu wrote the script and meticulously designed the sets and costumes. Audiences need to be acknowledged Zen in order to understand the Zen theme in the film. A Touch of Zen. [3], At the 24th Hong Kong Film Awards various Asian film critics, filmmakers and actors voted for the top Chinese films from Hong Kong, Taiwan and China. Action adventure with a lyrical feel, this is a kung fu film with a strong spiritual element. In Pu Songling’s original story, the male scholar does not pursue being a knight-errant and the separation between wen and wu. Don’t be fooled by the first hour, which is quite a chore of plot to sit through (interesting to note that this was released in two parts, à la Kill Bill vols. Throughout the movie though, through helping Yang, he draws upon his knowledge of Military Strategy to demoralize the soldiers after them (a … Gus’s review published on Letterboxd: Structure is key with a film this long. [37], On July 19, 2016, American home video company The Criterion Collection released the film on Blu-ray and DVD using the same 4K restoration also used by the Masters of Cinema release. [5], One of the brilliant scenes, the bamboo forest sword fight is said to have taken twenty-five days to shoot the ten-minute confrontation. "[28], The film was awarded the Technical Grand Prize and nominated for the Palme d'Or at the 1975 Cannes Film Festival. Rayns suggests this “political resonance” (p. 82). Services. Summaries. Sublime and sprawling, A TOUCH OF ZEN is perhaps the greatest in King Hu's series of ground-breaking, metaphysical period dramas. In 2011, the Tapei Golden Horse Film Festival had 122 industry professionals take part in the survey.
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