Introduction

The release of the espionage thriller Lust/Caution in 2007, Ang Lee’s first film since his take on a highly sensitive topic in Brokeback Mountain brought him worldwide attention in 2005, proved controversial in more ways than one. First of all, the project paired the filmmaking artistry of Ang Lee with the literary prowess of China’s most famous female author of the twentieth century. Eileen Chang (1920–95) first became well known for her intricate and exquisitely wrought fiction produced in mid-1940s Japanese-occupied Shanghai, and her astounding literary reputation created loyal followers throughout Taiwan, Hong Kong, and China. This alone, the fact that Lee was adapting a short story (rendered in English as “Lust, Caution”) by a revered figure in China’s literary heritage, set the bar for the film extraordinarily high. Yet even more controversial was the film’s “erotic politics”: the torrid sex between the female spy and the collaborator, only vaguely implied in Chang’s story, was turned into three explicit sex scenes with accompanying visual and visceral effects; the female protagonist’s full frontal nudity touched off a raging inferno of internet criticism in China. Ang Lee was vilified as a “traitor” for allowing his leading character to debase herself shamelessly in the great patriotic war against Japan, and Eileen Chang similarly chastised for “blurring right from wrong, loyalty from betrayal” (“bulun shifei, bubian zhongjian” 不論是非, 不辨忠奸). ¹ That a single film adaptation could have aroused such heated controversy over sex, nationalism, and betrayal was astonishing beyond all expectation. This volume, a collaborative effort to analyze the Lust/Caution phenomenon and give it the full-length critical scrutiny it deserves, is the first of its kind.