The Assassin
The Assassin
Winner of Best Director at the 68th Cannes Film Festival, The Assassin reimagines the action genre through radical restraint and visual precision. Set during the waning years of the Tang dynasty, the film follows Nie Yinniang, a trained assassin tasked with killing a powerful regional leader bound to her by family ties. Hou replaces spectacle with stillness, framing violence as absence rather than action. Through meticulous composition and sound design, The Assassin transforms historical legend into a meditation on power, loyalty and moral hesitation.