A Touch of Zen

Introduced by Howard Hao-Chun Yang
 
The young scholar Gu lives near a haunted fort when he befriends Yang, a mysterious woman in hiding. After a night of passion, she reveals that her father was executed by the powerful eunuch Wei, and that she is fleeing his agents. When the agents attack, Gu’s cunning saves the day. Yang becomes a Buddhist nun but rushes to rescue Gu upon hearing that he is in danger, leading to an inevitable confrontation with Wei. As the first Mandarin film to win at a major European film festival, its iconic bamboo forest duel inspired directors like Ang Lee, Zhang Yimou, and Tsui Hark. (FR)

Howard Hao-Chun Yang is a film curator at the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute.