All-TIME 100 Movies

Director: King Hu

Year Released: 1971

Cast: Billy Chan, Ping-Yu Chang

Kung-fu movies came to the West via the grunting charisma of Bruce Lee. But his were standard revenge thrillers, showcases for the acrobatics of machismo. For a marriage of martial and cinematic art, King Hu was the man. And A Touch of Zen, the first Chinese action movie to win a prize at the Cannes Film Festival, is his masterpiece. In this three-hr. epic, a modest scholar (Shih Jun) hooks up with a resolute girl (Hsu Feng) to challenge a vicious warlord. Influenced, like so many major Hong Kong action directors of the period, by the samurai epics of Akira Kurosawa and other Japanese directors, Hu brought a unique buoyancy to the action genre. His performers literally bounced (on unseen trampolines) through forests and over hills, and — because Hu’s camera has a muscular grace as well — the viewer soars with them. Leading the acrobatic procession is Hsu Feng. Just 18 when the film was made, she remains the screen’s gravest, most ravishing woman warrior.

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• Behind the List

• A - C

• D - F

• G - J

• K - M

• N - P

• Q - S

• T - Z

• Great Performances

  • Marlon Brando, On the Waterfront
  • James Cagney, White Heat
  • Faye Dunaway, Chinatown
  • Cary Grant, Notorious
  • Barbara Stanwyck, Double Indemnity
  • Jean Renoir, The Rules of the Game
  • Raj Kapoor, Awara
  • Judy Holliday, Bells Are Ringing
  • Bill Murray, Groundhog Day
  • Brigitte Lin, Swordsman II

• Guilty Pleasures

  • Gone With the Wind, 1939, Victor Fleming, U.S.
  • Tenth Avenue Angel, 1949, Roy Rowland, U.S.
  • Sailor Beware, 1951, Hal Walker, U.S.
  • Diabolique (Les Diaboliques), 1955, Henri-Georges Clouzot, France
  • School Girl, 1971, David Reberg, U.S
  • There’s Something About Mary,1998, Bobby and Peter Farrelly, U.S.
  • Anatomy of a Murder, 1959, Otto Preminger, U.S.
  • Gun Crazy, 1949, Joseph H. Lewis, U.S.
  • The Incredible Shrinking Man, 1957, Jack Arnold, U.S.
  • Joe Versus the Volcano, 1990, John Patrick Shanley, U.S.

• 10 Best Soundtracks

• Talkback

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