The Assassin (刺客聂隐娘) won Hou Hsiao-Hsien (henceforth HHH) the Best Director award at this year's Cannes Film Festival. This being a HHH film means that every scene is laden with meaning and metaphors. Sometimes shots will linger far longer than you need them to be and at other times shots will cut away faster than you thought they should. Dialogue is sparse but dense. Gaps are all over the narrative but HHH expects you to use your imagination to fill in the gaps. That means this is a wuxia film that doesn't tell the usual rip-roaring story with heightened music cues dictating how you should think. Hold your horses for Ip Man 3 in December for the usual cookie-cutter plot-lines. The Assassin will need you to put on your thinking cap.
HHH has distilled the lonely life of an assassin with stiletto focus, but without the clarity, in Academy 4:3 aspect ratio except for a few shots. This is a slow-burn of a film that has no regard for pace, but with total cognizance for equilibrium, tempo and rhythm. The shot composition is breathtaking without calling attention to itself. This is a feast for the eyes and succor for the soul. A day has passed since I saw it but some of the exquisite shots continue to linger in my mind, like the shot through flowing silk curtains and crackling candles. One of the final shots of the nun standing on a mountain top overlooking a breathtaking view of the valley completely took my breath away. Yinniang walks towards her and kneels down to pay her final respects, and the clouds at that precise moment envelop everything. HHH must have waited to get that one perfect beguiling long take, which is simply ravishing and resplendent.
Narratively and thematically, the film is determinedly inert, but it is never to its detriment. If you have seen HHH's films, you would know there is one way to watch movies and there is the HHH's way of watching one. For anyone not clued in to HHH's films, it would seem that The Assassin is stylistically fastidious, exasperatingly opaque and it could easily put anyone into a slumber, especially when action scenes are few and far in between. HHH's characters glide in and out with a lot of grace and posturing, but never with any falsity. I have to confess that I did find it at times frustrating and nearly nodded off a few times. However I kept my attention as sharp as I could because every shot is just beautiful to ogle at, even if the meaning feels elusive. The fun comes later. Over lunch my wife and I deconstructed the film and filled in the gaps. I cannot tell you how fun an exercise that is, especially when you are with the right partner.
The film excites us with words not spoken and actions not played out in the usual resolution. The Assassin is a game of sustaining every narrative element in the perfect stasis of mood and rhythm, and Hou Hsiao Hsien is the game master.
HHH has distilled the lonely life of an assassin with stiletto focus, but without the clarity, in Academy 4:3 aspect ratio except for a few shots. This is a slow-burn of a film that has no regard for pace, but with total cognizance for equilibrium, tempo and rhythm. The shot composition is breathtaking without calling attention to itself. This is a feast for the eyes and succor for the soul. A day has passed since I saw it but some of the exquisite shots continue to linger in my mind, like the shot through flowing silk curtains and crackling candles. One of the final shots of the nun standing on a mountain top overlooking a breathtaking view of the valley completely took my breath away. Yinniang walks towards her and kneels down to pay her final respects, and the clouds at that precise moment envelop everything. HHH must have waited to get that one perfect beguiling long take, which is simply ravishing and resplendent.
Narratively and thematically, the film is determinedly inert, but it is never to its detriment. If you have seen HHH's films, you would know there is one way to watch movies and there is the HHH's way of watching one. For anyone not clued in to HHH's films, it would seem that The Assassin is stylistically fastidious, exasperatingly opaque and it could easily put anyone into a slumber, especially when action scenes are few and far in between. HHH's characters glide in and out with a lot of grace and posturing, but never with any falsity. I have to confess that I did find it at times frustrating and nearly nodded off a few times. However I kept my attention as sharp as I could because every shot is just beautiful to ogle at, even if the meaning feels elusive. The fun comes later. Over lunch my wife and I deconstructed the film and filled in the gaps. I cannot tell you how fun an exercise that is, especially when you are with the right partner.
The film excites us with words not spoken and actions not played out in the usual resolution. The Assassin is a game of sustaining every narrative element in the perfect stasis of mood and rhythm, and Hou Hsiao Hsien is the game master.