Chen Kaige: One of China’s Greatest Directors
By Charles Custer, About.com Guide
See More About:chinese filmchen kaigefifth generationchinese filmmakers
Chen Kaige: One of China’s Greatest Directors
Chen Kaige
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Chen Kaige is an accomplished director and filmmaker who is part of what is commonly called the fifth generation of Chinese cinema. His films include Yellow Earth, Farewell My Concubine, and The Emperor and the Assassin.
Name: Chen Kaige (陈凯歌)
Gender: Male
Profession: Director/producer
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Born on May Fourth: The New Culture Movement and its Influence on Early Communist Rhetoric by Vincent Galvin History 131 Professor Lee 18 December 2001'As long as there shall be stones, he seeds of fire will not die.' Lu Xun, December 1935 On May Fourth 1919 over three thousand Beijing intellectuals met in Tiananmen Square to protest the results of the Paris Peace Treaty. The protesters disagreed ...
Born: August 12, 1952
Birthplace: Beijing, China
Why You Should Know Chen Kaige
Chen was one of the most prominent members of the “fifth generation” of Chinese cinema. Chen, like many of China’s other famous directors in the 1980s and 1990s, graduated the Beijing Film Academy in 1982 as part of the first class to graduate after the Academy had been shut down because of the Cultural Revolution. His first film, Yellow Earth quickly set the tone for fifth-generation films with its striking cinematography (the film’s cinematographer was Zhang Yimou, who went on to be quite a famous director himself).
It received quite a bit of attention abroad, and kick-started the foreign interest in Chinese cinema that helped Chen and his contemporaries achieve success. From there, Chen went on to direct numerous films; his most acclaimed is probably 1993’s Farewell My Concubine, which was nominated for two Academy Awards and won the Palme d’Or at Cannes.
Chen’s Life
Chen was born in Beijing, the son of an accomplished film director named Chen Huaiai, who was making popular film’s throughout Chen’s childhood. In the 1960s, just as Chen became a teenager, the Cultural Revolution kicked into high gear. Chen joined the Red Guards and, at the age of 15, publicly denounced his father. Later, like many youth at the time, he was sent to the countryside to learn about the struggles of the masses firsthand through labor, and when his assignment was completed, he stayed and joined the military.
Chen’s experience during the Cultural Revolution left a deep impression on him, and his relationship with and denunciation of his father, which he came to regret, is something that is addressed in several of his films, including Farewell My Concubine and Together. Chen has said that he would like to make a film about the Cultural Revolution, but that he hasn’t yet written the story because such a film would never be sanctioned by Chinese authorities.
He did not return to Beijing until 1975, taking a job at the Beijing Film Processing Laboratory until Mao’s successor Deng re-opened schools, including the Beijing Film Academy, and Chen enrolled. There, he met Zhang Yimou, and after they graduated, the two collaborated on Yellow Earth, which stunned audiences with its stark beauty when it was shown outside China for the first time at the Hong Kong Film Festival. Its success launched Chen’s career in earnest (as well as that of Zhang Yimou), and over the next decade he made six more films, including Farewell My Concubine, and also did a short stint as a visiting scholar in the United States at New York University.
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In the second half of the 1990s he made Tempress Moon and The Emperor and the Assassin, both period dramas starring Gong Li. 2000 saw his first and only foray into English-language film with Killing Me Softly starring Heather Graham, but the film was a disappointment and Chen quickly returned to Chinese-language cinema with Together in 2002. 2005 saw the release of The Promise, a more commercially-oriented film than Chen’s typically-contemplative work. But after a few other less notable films, Chen made a smashing return to form with 2010’s The Sacrifice, a box-office hit, and his latest film (2012’s Caught in the Web), was China’s submission to the Academy Awards, although it did not win.
Chen has been married three times, but his current wife is actress Chen Hong, who has appeared in several of his films since their marriage in 1996.
Recommended Films
If you want to check out Chen’s work, here are the best films to start with:
Yellow Earth (1985) – Slow-paced and beautiful, Yellow Earth tells the story of a Communist soldier who is sent to the countryside to collect folk songs. He doesn’t find the happy songs he was looking for, but he does find a different surprise…
Farewell My Concubine (1993) – A twisting, turning story about two men who met as child apprentices in the Peking Opera as they grow older, attain fame, and fight over a woman while the sweeping changes that shook China in the twentieth century unfold in the background.
The Emperor and the Assassin (1999) – A period drama about a plot to assassinate the King of Qin (the man who united China for the first time in 221 BCE) that is refreshingly frank and devoid of the flying kung-fu masters and other martial arts fantasies that sometimes plague films about ancient Chinese history.
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The Changes of the Situation of Women as Presented in Three Cuban Films The Cuban revolution has brought about great change for women. Prior to C astros reign, women mainly had lives that revolved around the household, and very few had professional jobs. Also, they were traditionally seen as subordinate to men in political and social situations. Gradually, women became more active outside of the ...
The Sacrifice (2010) – An adaptation of a famous play about a man who sacrifices his own son to save the baby of a powerful local family that has been massacred. But his new father is plotting revenge on his family’s killers as he raises their enemies’ heir right under their noses.
