Lust, Caution

The Smithsonian Freer/Sackler Museums present a screening of Lust, Caution by Ang Lee.

Sexual passion and political intrigue prove to be a combustible mix in this powerful espionage thriller that won Lee the coveted Golden Lion at the 2007 Venice Film Festival. Set in Japanese-occupied Shanghai in the years leading up to World War II, it stars Tang Wei as a college student who is drawn into a daring plot to seduce and assassinate brutal intelligence agent Mr. Yee (Tony Leung). The couple’s notoriously explicit sex scenes earned the film an NC-17 rating, but they are necessary to maintain the ambiguity of each character’s motives: Do they truly desire each other, or is it only a sadomasochistic game echoing the violent political turmoil around them? “A brooding meditation on the unnerving power and terrible cost of emotional and political masquerades … Lust, Caution gets under your skin with its examination of what qualifies as love and what does not” (Ken Turan, Los Angeles Times). Intended for mature audiences. (Dir.: Ang Lee, United States/China/Taiwan/Hong Kong, 2007, 157 min., Mandarin with English subtitles)