Nie Yinniang

Hou Hsiao-Hsien is a Taiwanese film director. He is a perfectionist and has spent almost eight years making his latest film, Nie Yinniang. Here it is called The Assassin, although “yinniang” actually means “hiding woman”, and it could be called The Woman in Black.

You may choose not to see this film for reasons that will become clear. You may want to talk about this film which is where I step in to help you. It is in Mandarin and set in China in the ninth century, the era of the Tang Dynasty. The genre is wuxia (literally, “martial hero”) with a smattering of jianghu (literally, “rivers and lakes”).

Every shot in this 105 minute epic is beautifully composed. You are drenched in colour, the costumes are to die for and the soundtrack an important part of the overall effect of the film. The interiors were shot in a studio in Taiwan. The stunning outdoor scenes are the Wudang mountains in China and some scenes were filmed at Kyoto and Nara in Japan. Now for the gowns; everyone, male and female, wears the most beautiful gowns. Think Favourbrook on Jermyn Street and you will have an inkling. The costume designer sourced silk from India for these sumptuous outfits – as really happened in Tang China.

The soundtrack picks up natural sounds. There is a lot of chirruping of birds and insects, bird wings beating and the sound of feet moving through grass. The impact of all this is a visual and aural banquet.

So why won’t you see this remarkable film? You will if you are truly a cineaste. You won’t if you like a story that you can understand and want a plot that moves along briskly. While I basked in the rich texture of this exquisite film it was a long 105 minutes. The lady sitting beside me quickly fell asleep. When she woke up she stretched her arms, like Top Cat getting into his pyjamas. That was the only funny part of the evening; Hou doesn’t do humour.