biography
| name: |
Zhang Yimou
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sometimes credited as Yi-Mou Zhang
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1951– )
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| biography:
| Film director and actor, born in Xian, C China. During the Cultural Revolution (1966–76) he was sent to work in a small village N of Xian and later to a cotton mill. He then struggled to be admitted to the Beijing Film Academy, and became one of the first group of students to be accepted after it re-opened in 1978. It was from this group that China's ‘Fifth Generation’ of film-makers was born, a group of directors who sought to break away from traditional, didactic role models, demanding independent thought of the viewer and dealing explicitly with the profound problems of a contemporary socialist society. He was then sent to the tiny Guangxi Film studio, where he worked as a cinematographer. In 1986 he started work at the Xian Film Studios, where he played the lead in Wu Tianming's Lao jing (1986, Old Well), for which he won the Best Actor Award at the 1987 Tokyo International Film Festival. His debut as a director came in 1987 with Hong gao liang (Red Sorghum), which won him critical acclaim and was also a box office success both nationally and internationally. Later films include, Da hong deng long gaogao gua (1991, Raise the Red Lantern), Huozhe (1994, released in the West variously as, To Live, Lifetimes, Living), Yi Ge Dou Bu Neng Shao (1999, Not One Less) and Wo De Fu Qin Mu Qin (2000, The Road Home). Several of his films have won prestigious international awards. |
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