Chen Kaige

essential information

Acting experience

In 1984, he made his first film "loess land" and began his career as a director. The film established Chen Kaige's creative route and direction of exploring humanistic themes, and won silver leopard award at the 38th Locarno International Film Festival. With this film, Chen Kaige won the director's award at the 29th Edinburgh International Film Festival. In the same year, he directed his first TV play "forced takeoff" 》The film won the excellent TV Drama Award of the 5th China TV drama flying sky award.

In 1986, he directed the feature film "the great parade"; the film style maintains the symbolism and allegory of "the Yellow Earth"; he won the jury award of the 11th Montreal International Film Festival and the International Youth Film Festival Award in Turin, Italy.

In 1987, he directed the drama "the king of children", starring Xie Yuan, Yang Xuewen and Chen Shaohua. The film was shortlisted for the Golden Palm Award in the main competition unit of the 41st Cannes International Film Festival. He adopted the prose narrative style in the film and won the special director award of the 8th China Golden Rooster Award for the film. In the same year, he went to the United States to study film. He returned to China in 1990.

In 1991, he directed the feature film "singing while walking", which was shortlisted for the Palme d'Or award in the 44th Cannes International Film Festival and won the best film award in Istanbul International Film Festival. In the film, he adopted the narrative style of combining storytelling and popularity, and integrated the thinking of national character.

In 1993, the film "Farewell My Concubine", starring Zhang Guorong, Zhang Fengyi and Gong Li, made a box office of US $5.22 million when it was released in the United States. It has been nominated for the best foreign language film at the 66th Academy Awards, the Palme d'Or at the 46th Cannes International Film Festival and the best foreign language film at the 51st Golden Globe of American film and television; In the same year, he was also a member of the jury of the Venice International Film Festival.

In 1995, he was the artistic director of the drama Kong Fansen. In 1996, he directed the literary film "wind and moon", which was shortlisted for the Golden Palm Award in the 49th Cannes International Film Festival.

In 1998, he served as a member of the jury of Cannes International Film Festival. In the same year, he also served as the director and producer of the historical film Jingke assassinating King Qin starring Gong Li, Zhang Fengyi and Li Xuejian, which was shortlisted for the Golden Palm Award of the 52nd Cannes International Film Festival.

In April 2002, he directed the costume drama "Lv Bu and Diao Chan"; in September, he was the director and producer of the feature film "with you", which was nominated for the best Asian Film Award of the 23rd Hong Kong Film Awards and the best feature film award of the 22nd China Film Golden Rooster award. Chen Kaige won the best director award of the 22nd China Film Golden Rooster Award for this film; in the same year, he was a thriller《 It's Chen Kaige's first Hollywood film and his transition to commercial film.

In 2005, he made the epic film Wuji, which was nominated for the best foreign language film at the 63rd Golden Globe Awards of American film and television. Two weeks after its release in the mainland of China, the film made a box office record of 130 million yuan, breaking the box office records of Chinese films at the opening, first day, single day and the first weekend. In addition, he also served as the director of the feature film "wind rises and clouds" The art direction of art.

In 2008, Mei Lanfang, a biographical film starring liming, Zhang Ziyi, sun Honglei and Chen Hong, made a box office of 42.18 million yuan in its premiere week, and was shortlisted for the Golden Bear Award in the 59th Berlin International Film Festival, and was nominated for the best feature film award in the 27th China Golden Rooster Award and the best Asian Film Award in the 28th Hong Kong Film Awards Song won the Kurosawa award at the 21st Tokyo International Film Festival.

In 2010, he directed the costume film orphan Zhao, starring ge you, Wang Xueqi, Huang Xiaoming and Fan Bingbing. As of December 20, the film had a box office performance of 180 million yuan. In the same year, he won the outstanding contribution award for Chinese films at the 13th Shanghai International Film Festival.

In 2012, he was the director and screenwriter of the feature film Search starring Gao Yuanyuan, Yao Chen, Zhao Youting and Wang Luodan, and won the "special award for excellent screenplay" in the 4th China Film Association Cup. In 2013, he served as chairman of the jury of the 26th Tokyo International Film Festival.

Guo Baoling and Zhang Daoqiang, the directors of the Chinese Drama Association, starred in the 60th annual box office commendation conference in 2015.

In August 2016, his six-year-old costume drama "the story of the demon cat" was launched in Tang City, starring Huang Xuan, a Chinese and Japanese student, and Jiang Tai rangu; in December, he was elected member of the 10th Committee of the Chinese Federation of literary and art circles.

In February 2017, he participated in recording the second season of "familiar taste" of Haitian flavor industry, and expressed gratitude to his wife Chen Hong in the program.

In July, 2019, he directed the film "blossoming in the dust"; in September, he directed the film "me and my motherland"; in the same month, he joined the director of the reality show "actors, please be in place for the first season"; in October, he served as the image ambassador and chairman of the jury of the sixth Silk Road International Film Festival; in November, he won the best director award of the third Golden screen Award for his film "me and my motherland". In the same year, he served as the director of the 32nd China Golden Rooster Awards.

In September 2020, he will continue to join Tencent video director in the second season of the reality show cast in place as a program mentor. On September 27, the director's Micro film Shuzhen was put on file and went online at 0:00 on September 28. On October 25, the film "Changjin Lake", jointly produced and directed by Chen Kaige, Tsui Hark and Lin Chaoxian, was launched; on November 8, the TV series "youth creation", which was the director of the production, was broadcast in iqiyi.

Personal life

In 1987, Chen Kaige and Hong Huang lived together. In 1989, Chen Kaige married Hong Huang in the United States. In 1991, Chen Kaige divorced Hong Huang and lived with Ni Ping at the end of the same year. In 1996, Chen Kaige and Ni Ping broke up; in the same year, Chen Kaige and Chen Hong registered for marriage in the United States.

Main works

Take part in TV series

Take part in the film

Directing works

Production works

Art direction

variety show

Award winning record

social activities

On July 5, 2015, Chen Kaige became the president of Shanghai Film Academy.

Character evaluation

Chen Kaige is one of the representatives of the fifth generation directors in China. He is also a film poet with deep literary quality and deep thought. He is good at analyzing the restriction and influence of the burden of history and tradition on human spirit, showing the complexity of human beings, and at the same time, criticizing unreasonable and inhumane human weakness. His films are full of concern and yearning for a more harmonious and wise human existence. With his profound cultural heritage and solid artistic skills, he expressed his strong humanistic consciousness and aesthetic pursuit, and mobilized a variety of film means to form his own unique heavy and sharp, peaceful and exciting film style (film website, film literature, Golden Eagle online review).

Chen Kaige is an individual director who carries the cultural characteristics of Chinese film. His hobby of reading brings him rich knowledge, and his constant thinking makes his thoughts grand and profound. His special experience during the Cultural Revolution strengthens his strong sense of mission and responsibility for society and culture. Although his films are obscure, they embody the characteristics of Chinese culture and the spiritual pursuit of Chinese literati. Most of his films are full of strong cultural atmosphere, with a high cultural character. In the film "the Yellow Earth", he focuses on the ordinary people living on the yellow earth, which fully reflects his deep concern and excavation for human nature. In the movie farewell my concubine, he made a compromise between his pure personal artistic style and popular style. At the time of the decline of the fifth generation of films, he completed the alternation of styles with timely changes (film review, Golden Eagle online review).

Chen Kaige's film creation is philosophical and pioneering. His films are full of speculative color, adding symbols or metaphors to the traditional story level, showing the continuity and change of history in a specific period. His thinking on the way of national existence has been in a broader cultural background, which makes his works leap to a higher level of philosophy. Therefore, Chen Kaige is more like a philosopher. His films are beautiful and sublime. In addition, Chen Kaige is full of expectation and curiosity about the development of film language. In his first work, the loess land, he takes the loess as the main body, occupying more than three-quarters of the screen, while people are placed on the edge of the picture frame, which is extremely small. This is an important turning point for Chinese films to break through the theoretical framework and focus on expressiveness (review of northern Music).

Character controversy

On January 8, 2019, Chen Kaige wrote his memoir about defamation of others. The people's Court of Haidian District, Beijing, ruled that the defendant Chen Kaige made a written apology to the plaintiff Qiu Luguang in Legal Daily, Beijing Evening News and writer's digest to eliminate the influence. Qiu Luguang applied for execution, but Chen Kaige refused to apologize, and the Court published a notice on the case.

Chinese PinYin : Chen Kai Ge