King's Movies

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It must be in the 70s when I first read about King Hu's movie A Touch of Zen in The Times magazine but it was only recently that I got fortunate enough to watch the movie which reputedly won the Technical Prize in the 1975 Cannes Film Festival and that was all thanks to the DVD which I happened to pick up from a vendor and which, much to my delight, contains some of King Hu's better films like Dragon Gate Inn and Raining in the Mountain. King Hu (胡金铨) by the way, was a Hong Kong and Taiwan-based film director who directed Come Drink with Me in 1966 and Dragon Gate Inn in 1967 and brought Chinese cinema to new technical and artistic heights. A Touch of Zen is regarded as King Hu's masterpiece and together with Raining in the Mountains and Legend of the Mountains, all of which being loosely based on Pu Songling's Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio, blend Chan Buddhism and unique Chinese aesthetics. King Hu said to have passed away in Taipei of complications from angioplasty, undoubtedly, left a legacy of splendid wuxia movies.

Some of King Hu's movies...
Come Drink with Me, Starring Cheng Pei Pei and Yueh Hua...


...A Touch of Zen...Starring Hsu Feng and Roy Chiao...


...Dragon Gate Inn... Starring Polly Shang Kwan Ling Feng and Hsu Feng...



...and Raining in the Mountain...Starring Hsu Feng and Sun Yueh.


Comments

Liudmila said…
it seems he was passionate of the culture of own nation. It would be interesting to see one. Translated. :0) We spoke with my friends about Chinese opera 2 days ago. All are fashinated with this particular art.
4 December 2010 at 13:15
footiam said…
Culture should fascinate human beings. A Touch of Zen is well received in the West, if I am not mistaken. I like the first part of the movie, the latter half is too Zen for my liking but the critics seem to love it. Perhaps, you can find that in You Tube.
9 December 2010 at 04:00
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