At first glance, Jia Zhang-ke‘s “Ash is Purest White” feels like an immaculately perfect patchwork film, taking cues from his 2013 masterwork “A Touch of Sin” and his flawed, but brilliant, 2015 epic “Mountains May Depart,” as well as the docu-drama Chinese glimpse of “Still Life.” It’s odd, considering that Zhang-ke is not known for repetition — in fact, the only repetitiveness we keep seeing is the use of his wife and muse Zhao Tao in his movies. The director is famous for continuously trying to re-examine and reinvent the language of cinema with every movie.