Get 20% off a Lifetime Plex Pass
Enjoy this special deal, this Geek Week only.
Learn More
Find Movies & TV
Home
Live TV
On Demand
Explore
Movies & TV Shows
Most Popular
Leaving Soon
Categories
Action
Animation
Comedy
Crime
Descriptive Audio
Documentary
Drama
En Español
Horror
Music
Romance
Sci-Fi
Thriller
Western
Explore
Browse Channels
Featured Channels
NFL Channel
Ion Mystery
CBS Sports HQ
Categories
Hit TV
Crime
Reality
News
Sports
Game Shows
History & Science
Sci-Fi & Action
Movies
Chills & Thrills
Classic TV
Nature & Travel
Comedy
Black Entertainment
Cooking
Home
Kids & Family
Sporting
En Español
International
Gaming & Anime
Lifestyle
Music
Sign In
The Assassin
Directed by
Hou Hsiao-hsien
2015
1h 45m
Not Rated
Action
,
History
,
Drama
6.3
80%
48%
Add to Watchlist
A female assassin receives a dangerous mission to kill a political leader in eighth-century China.
More
Where to Watch The Assassin
AsianCrush
Free
Freevee
Free
Kanopy
Free
+14 more
Cast of The Assassin
Shu Qi
Nie Yinniang
Chang Chen
Tian Ji'an
Nikki Hsieh
Concubine Huji
Sheu Fang-Yi
Jiaxin
Ethan Juan
Xia Jing
Xu Fan
The Nun
Zuo Xiaoqing
Taoist Nun
Satoshi Tsumabuki
The Mirror Polisher
Ni Dahong
Nie Feng
Shih Chun
Old Herb Picker
Zhou Yun
Lord Tian Ji'an's Wife
Mei Fang
Nie Feng's Mother
Jacques Picoux
Lady Tian's Teacher
Yong Mei
Yinniang's Mother
Zhen Yu Lei
Tien Xing
Shao-Huai Chang
Chiang Nu
Leon Dai
Tian Xu
Jack Kao
Yuan Yi
Hsin-Yu Ling
The Assassin Reviews
Arizona Republic
Barbara VanDenburgh
It's so elliptical in its approach that there's no love for anyone, or anything, outside of beauty. It can be admired - greatly, even - but it can't be felt.
San Francisco Chronicle
G. Allen Johnson
Part of the problem is Hou's style works at odds with the material.
Seattle Times
Soren Andersen
The visuals relegate the acting to secondary importance. They overwhelm the story. And they make "The Assassin" unforgettable.
Detroit News
Adam Graham
"The Assassin" is gorgeous to look at, but not all that compelling to watch.
Washington Post
Mark Jenkins
As with Wong Kar-wai's "The Ashes of Time," Hou's take on the martial-arts flick is affectionate, but may frustrate fans of the genre. "The Assassin" is a mood piece, evoking rather than explaining.
Philadelphia Inquirer
Steven Rea
Although Hou Hsiao-Hsien's The Assassin is technically a wuxia film - martial arts, swordplay, the whoosh of arrows in flight - it is much more a film of stillness, quiet, beauty.
Boston Globe
Ty Burr
It's not for everyone. But if you think it's for you - if you believe that beauty is its own reward - find the biggest canvas on which to behold this movie that you possibly can. It's IMAX for aesthetes.
Reel Talk Online
Candice Frederick
I say this all to say that folks have been fallen all over themselves for the Chinese drama, THE ASSASSIN, which is indeed a solid film but nothing I haven't see before
BuzzFeed News
Alison Willmore
It's so lovely, from the brocade draped interiors to the mist moving over a landscape in the half light, like a series of confounding paintings placed end to end.
New York Times
A.O. Scott
The film is intriguing, but ultimately opaque, a lovely, inert object that offers, in the name of movie love, an escape from so much that is vital and interesting about movies.
Chicago Reader
J. R. Jones
The story promises action, but this brooding martial-arts adventure from Hou Hsiao-hsien is largely a pictorial experience.
AV Club
Ignatiy Vishnevetsky
The Assassin is one of the most flat-out beautiful movies of the last decade, and also one of the most puzzling.
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
So ravishingly lovely that tracking the plot is far less important than luxuriating in the images.
RogerEbert.com
Peter Sobczynski
Visually ravishing and formally graceful ...
TheWrap
Alonso Duralde
Hou's brand of reserve might not be for all audiences, but arthouse admirers of cinematic stillness will find themselves enraptured by this hypnotic tale.
New Yorker
Richard Brody
Hou Hsiao-hsien's historical drama, set in ninth-century China, fuses political struggles and family grudges into images of a sumptuous stillness, which he punctuates with spasms of extravagant martial artistry.
Newsday
John Anderson
Not for everyone, but gloriously cinematic, utterly absorbing.
Los Angeles Times
Mark Olsen
Combining Hou's patient, observant style with a historical martial arts tale, the film is a fascinating hybrid of craft, genre and story.
NPR
Ella Taylor
With and without allegory, to watch The Assassin is to be carried along in the river of life, in all its ecstasy and terror.
The Daily Beast
Nick Schager
[The Assassin] operates as if it were a dream, employing Hou's trademark long takes and unhurried camera movements to lull one into a trance, the better to then deliver thrills through jolts of measured, expertly choreographed violence.
Watch The Assassin Videos
The Assassin (US)
The Assassin (US)
Trailer
Take Plex everywhere
Watch free anytime, anywhere, on almost any device.
See the full list of supported devices
Home
Live TV
On Demand
Discover