A Touch of Sin

Jia Zhangke has described A Touch of Sin as a “martial arts film for contemporary China.” The title pays homage to King Hu’s wuxia epic, A Touch of Zen (1971). However, the comparison may seem faulty at first glance. Hu’s existential period piece involves chivalrous knights-errant who travel the land and seek out noble adventures, leading to a rather unconventional three-hour meditation on fighting for honorable causes; how women, too, can serve as warriors; and Buddhist transcendence. By contrast, Jia’s film adopts an anthology format, telling four distinct but superficially interwoven stories, each loosely based on actual events that occurred in contemporary China. Each finds its protagonist exposed to the corruption, humiliation, and despair that result from a capitalist system. Its characters respond with bloody violence, either because they’ve reached their limit or resolved that violence is the only solution. Between the portmanteau format and modern-day setting, the two films seem to have little in common. However, the association invites comparison and leads to Jia’s transgressive confrontation with the consequences of China’s dramatic embrace of capitalism.

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