In a testament to Jia’s prowess, this turn did not include the usual drop in quality such changes usually entail, with “A Touch of Sin” being one of his best works, with the combination of mainstream and arthouse elements working particularly well.

| Original Score: 7.5 | Mar 30, 2025

A Touch of Sin addresses many of the themes and visual motifs Jia uses in his earlier work, except he exploits the moviegoer’s taste for genre violence, creating a cinematic spoonful of sugar to help his social critique go down.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Mar 19, 2025

Although the possibility of violence constantly looms, A Touch of Sin really seems to be about individuals and our choices in the face of not only threat, but the weight of doom from forces larger than ourselves.

| Feb 27, 2024

For patient, thoughtful viewers, it's one of the most rewarding experiences of the year.

| Original Score: A- | Aug 31, 2021

The fact that they are based on recent news events adds another layer to this sprawling, ambitious film. In A Touch of Sin, Jia's version of real life veers dangerously toward glossy fiction.

| Feb 24, 2021

The portrait it paints of modern China, and much of the modern world by extension, is not a pretty one, but where nihilism is often an easy resort for the cynical, Zhangke's is considered, thoughtful, and inconclusive.

| Feb 23, 2021

With A Touch of Sin, Chinese filmmaker Jia Zhangke enjoys something of a return to form.

| Feb 12, 2021

Surprisingly sensational considering this is coming from Jia Zhang-ke; A Touch of Sin is one of his best achievements, a memorably effective critique of humanity and the damage inflicted by systems of economy.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Nov 4, 2020

Jia Zhangke's powerful, violent and brilliant comment on modern China...

| Original Score: 5/5 | Sep 24, 2020

...seems to suggest that a touch of sin is all humanity needs to descend into a downward spiral.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jan 31, 2020

Jia hits us where it hurts, and it's impossible to look away.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Aug 7, 2019

The characters feel like blank slates rather than well-defined people, and the attempt to connect all four characters at the end is unnecessary. Regardless, A Touch of Sin is still worth watching if given the chance.

| Original Score: 6.8/10 | Jun 22, 2019

It's been some time since a drama has tackled the moral complexities of revenge quite so brutally -- and so well.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 21, 2019

A Touch of Sin puts together a picture of social unrest, class injustices and violent response bubbling just beneath the surface. Each story is loosely connected but the real link is a brewing anger levelled at an unfair social system.

| Jan 30, 2019

[Director Jia Zhangke] proves himself here a master of pacing.

| Aug 31, 2018

Has a propulsion that may slow down during its two-hour running time, but it never falters.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 31, 2018

A Touch of Sin, regardless of its faults, is still a thought-provoking film.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Aug 14, 2018

Although [director Jia Zhangke] makes a great deal in interviews of how the four stories are drawn from reported cases in recent years across the nation... A Touch of Sin plays contrary to a torn-from-the-headlines dramatization.

| Oct 2, 2017

The wuxia killings elevate A Touch of Sin into the territory of great revenge pictures, even as its ideology proves less than discernible.

| Original Score: B+ | Jun 22, 2016

Jia is one of those moviemakers who can tell a story in a single shot, and his eloquence is hard at work here ...

| Apr 12, 2016