After a festival run that included the likes of Cannes (where it won Best Director), TIFF, and the forthcoming NYFF, Well Go USA Entertainment will give Hou Hsiao-hsien‘s martial arts drama The Assassin a release next month. Today now brings the gorgeous U.S. trailer and poster for the film which also was named Taiwan’s Oscar entry.
Our review from Cannes said it’s “a movie so utterly, defiantly itself is never intended for the masses,” continuing by saying, “To those who seek to be challenged by uniquely cinematic voices, however, the towering achievement that is The Assassin should be apparent. Unhurried, mood-driven, pregnant with a transcendent reflection on life and death, The Assassin is a singular vision realized with absolute mastery of style and a lightness of touch that’s to die for. Of all the competition titles in Cannes this year, it just might be the most vitally unmissable.”
Check out the stunning trailer and poster below and read our interview with the director here.
In 9th-century China, Nie Yinniang is a young woman who was abducted in childhood from the family of a decorated general and raised by a nun who trained her in the martial arts. After 13 years of exile, she is returned to the land of her birth as an exceptional assassin, with orders to kill her former betrothed. She must confront her parents, her memories, and her long-repressed feelings in a choice to sacrifice the man she loves or break forever with the sacred way of the righteous assassins. Rich with shimmering, breathing texture and punctuated by brief but unforgettable bursts of action, THE ASSASSIN is a martial arts film like none made before it.
The Assassin opens on October 16th.