5/5 One of King Hu's masterpieces
  by David Alston (Chapel Hill, NC, USA)
Sublime and sprawling, A TOUCH OF ZEN is perhaps the greatest in King Hu's series of ground-breaking, metaphysical period dramas.

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). But it approaches being martial arts as Tarkovsky would have done it - the film is set up in three methodically paced, long sections (it's a 3 hour film), which all feature a bit of action but devote more attention to character, landscape and narrative. The focus of each section falls upon different characters, with the central character in each section embodying different virtues: the humility and creativity of the artist (the focus of the first act), courage and confidence in the second act, and an assured enlightenment in the third. The three acts are linked by tightly controlled and far more explosive bursts of action in an otherwise meditatively paced film.

Hu explores other elements as well - the first act, mostly devoted to the artist, eases viewers into a framework of intrigues that will shape the plot; this section of the film is very slow, but in hypnotic (and definitely not dull) fashion, with an abundance of careful set detail and some rather astounding landscape photography. Here, palace intrigues and suggestions of the supernatural (A TOUCH OF ZEN is loosely adapted from a number of Pu Songling's gently surreal stories, collected in "Strange Tales From A Chinese Studio") drive the slowly coalescing plot. Intriguingly, the ghost story elements explored early in the film are satirized a bit later, adding a discrete layer of obtuse irony and genre commentary to the overall proceedings.

Gradually shifting into a second act, which moves the focus to an imperial fugitive (Yang Huizhen) who is being tracked in the area. Here another of Hu's advances surfaces - Hu had a knack for creating strong and complex female characters, and the fugitive seen here is one of the most memorable; definitely a touchstone for Ang Lee, among many others.

A TOUCH OF ZEN is divided with an intermission (on the DVD - more on this later) into two halves, and this 'second act' falls on either side of this division. A semi-famous, and much imitated, action sequence is to be found here.

During the third act, the focus shifts again, to a group of monks that make a brief but memorable appearance earlier, and - as the level of action gradually rises, so does the level of mysticality, with Hu's complex and highly personal take on Buddhism recalling Andrei Tarkovsky's similarly mystical and oblique Christianity.

Throughout, we have Hu's sense of humor, a sort of greatly modified slapstick providing extra charm - the very playful sense of humor would seem to be a strange addition, but it somehow works, giving an otherwise slow, meditiative film a breezy sense of rhythm. Again, I would point out the influence of Pu Songling (perhaps upon Hu's entire body of work); Songling's work - a classic of Chinese literature, blends spiritualism, surrealism, unexpected humor, political intrigues, horror and hints of the erotic - and Hu is unafraid of blending these seemingly disparate qualities into a vast, and sublime, cinematic endeavor.

This is a beautifully shot film, on my personal short list of the most gorgeous ever, and the US/R1 DVD does present A TOUCH OF ZEN in all of its' widescreen glory. Unfortunately, the film seems to be otherwise unrestored, with an indistinct print and several spots of faded colors distracting from some exquisite compositions and landscape shots of a variety that would've made John Ford jealous (with at least one explicit visual reference to Kurosawa as well). I would hope to see a fully cleaned-up DVD available at some point in the hopefully not-too-distant future.

But - grainy DVD or not - this is something every cinephile out there should see.

-David Alston

5/5 SIMPLE, ELEGANT MIX OF CHINESE PHILOSOPHY, INCREDIBLE UNSPOILED SCENERY AND ACTION
  by Roy Clark (Edge of Toiyabe Nat'l Forest, NV)
In the first ten minutes I thought it was just okay;
then it did nothing but get better for the next 177 minutes. Director King Hu was a visionary;no wonder so many contemporary movies have explicitly and liberally lifted his ideas.

Unlike so many martial arts' movies, character reigns;
the plot is intricate, evolving and and motivates the action.
And the natural locations make me want to take a very long walk around China. A feeling of reality and naturalness prevails in every scene.

If you buy this, and you should, read the bio of King Hu Jing-Chaun; amazing what he's done and the lasting impact of his work. His genius really shines in Touch of Zen.

1/5 Idiocy to fast forward through
  by LF (USA)
This movie is terrible. It is three hours of nonsense. The pacing is so slow that you have to make a lot of use of the fast forward button. The fight scenes are laughable. The fighters hop like bunnies. Every single fight scene in this film, and in almost every other oriental so-called kung fu film, is absolute worthless garbage. Fast forward through all the fight scenes, which means fast forward through most of the movie. Also fast forward through all the scenes where nothing is happening. That doesn't leave much. They have a 15 minute movie with 170 minutes to skip. And someone tell me why the two stars of the film look so Caucasian. Is that the Chinese ideal of beauty? In the movie they make fun of superstition and belief in ghosts, but at the end they give us a final shot of a godlike image, more superstition. The star is actually some magical Buddhist abbot. Gimme a break. The only good thing about this horse manure is that the leading lady is very cute. Other than that, I can't think of a reason to waste 3 hours on baloney. And for all the people who place this idiocy at the top of their all time movie list, I have to question your motives. Do you want to seem smart? Is it cool to recognize crap simply because it is from another country? That is an insult to all the truly great foreign films. Just cause it's foreign, doesn't mean it's worth a damn. Placing this trash on a par with the truly great foreign films simply because it is foreign is an insult to the great ones. This movie, pure and simple, is inferior. It makes me wonder if the Chinese movie audience has the taste of little children.

4/5 One of the Time Magazine Top 100 Films
  by LGwriter (Astoria, N.Y. United States)
Included in the Time Magazine Best 100 Films of all time list, A Touch of Zen does not disappoint. Though it starts slowly, the momentum gradually increases until the viewer is completely caught up in the story of a refugee woman who seeks the help of two generals, disguised as common townfolk (one a blind man, the other a doctor), and a group of monks led by an abbot whose spiritual strength is expressed in his ability to thwart violence and defeat evil based on deflecting the advances of his enemy and using that deflection to repel whoever attacks.

This mystical bent is strong in the film and lends it some real juice. Also on hand is a poor artist who lives with his mother, a spy who wishes the artist to draw his portrait, the evil eunuch Hsu, a whole bunch of guards/soldiers in service to both Hsu and his "boss" Wei (the equally evil ruler), Mun-Ta (another bad guy), the town magistrate, and, of course, the artist's mother who's on hand for comic relief and as well to provide a touch of humanism to A Touch of Zen. The bad guys had previously tortured and murdered the refugee woman's father and are now out to finish her off, as well as the two generals who have sided with her.

A clear inspiration for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon--as many others have noted--this film boasts quite a few martial arts fights (mainly with swords) and quite a few flying leaps. It's also nice to see that a good looking woman, the refugee, is so adept at martial arts herself--women's lib had apparently hit China before it got to the US!!

This is a three hour film, broken into two parts, so there is actually an opening credit sequence for the second part of the film exactly like the first part sequence and a short (two-minute) recap of the last scene from the first part at the beginning of the second part. In addition, the image is somewhat muddy at times. In spite of these drawbacks (hence the four stars instead of five), this deservedly is part of the Time Magazine Top 100 Film List; it's a gripping story with great visuals and nary a false note anywhere.

Highly recommended.

3/5 I wish I'd seen it 25 years ago
  by Bradford Daniels (Redmond, WA)
I first heard of A Touch of Zen when it made the run of the art houses in London in the early 80s. I desperately wanted to see it, but by the time I had a free afternoon, it was already gone. Since then, I've been waiting anxiously for it to show up, first in repertory cinemas, then on VHS, and then on DVD.

Needless to say I was thrilled to see that the film was finally available on DVD. I got a copy as soon as I was able, popped it in the DVD changer, and settled back to watch. Two hours later, somewhat dejected, I found myself wondering whether I really wanted to continue watching this film, since its only remaining appeal to me was as a film history exercise.

All of this film's strong points are visual, and each visual technique has been done better in later films. It's interesting to see where some of these techniques originated (though some of my Chinese friends dispute whether the techniques were original even at the time), but unlike other films with pioneering visual styles (e.g. "The Seven Samurai" or "Zu: Warriors of the Magic Mountain"), the plot and characters just don't justify sitting through the whole thing.

Also, the film is often too self-consciously artistic, and definitely too long (or at least too slow-paced)... Though that could just be me, I suppose; I also thought "House of Flying Daggers" was too long and slow. (In my defense, I did like "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon" and "Hero", and I absolutely love all 208 minutes of "The Seven Samurai").

I don't think this film was overrated at the time it came out, but its value was entirely in its innovation, and not in the plot, characters, or even the action. As a result, it just doesn't hold up compared to all that followed.