Diversity

Since opening-up and reform at the end of 1970s, movie stars from Hong Kong and Taiwan, such as Maggie Cheung, Brigitte Lin and Joan Lin, have frequently appeared in Chinese mainland film productions. Appreciation of feminine aesthetics among moviegoers has thus broadened.

Joan Chen (now an American citizen) was the first Chinese actress to appear in English-speaking roles in Western mainstream films. Before going to the U.S. to study she had gained fame in the mainland for her role in Little Flower in 1979, and received best actress award at the 1981 Hundred Flowers Awards. In 1987, her role in Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor, which won nine academy awards, brought Chen international fame.

Chinese director Zhang Yimou’s selection of leading actresses stands testament to changes in audience appreciation of feminine beauty over the years. Gong Li and Zhang Ziyi have been his first choices. Gong Li was for years the Chinese actress that most appealed to Western audience’s sense of feminine beauty. When Mo Yan, author of Red Sorghum, first met Gong Li he doubted Zhang Yimou’s choice of her in the leading role – that of widow of a rural distillery owner who has an affair with one of her workers and later dies with her lover while resisting Japanese invaders. To Mo, Gong seemed antonymous with the character in his novel. But Gong’s performance proved Mo wrong. Gong Li took main roles in most of Zhang Yimou’s award-winning movies of the 1980s and 1990s. Zhang’s fellow fifth-generation director Chen Kaige also picked Gong Li to perform in his acclaimed Farewell My Concubine, the Chinese-language film that won the Cannes Palme d’Or. Zhang Yimou cast Zhang Ziyi in her cinematic debut at the age of 19 in The Road Home, which won two awards at the 2000 Berlin International Film Festival, that of the Jury Grand Prix (second best film) and Prize of the Ecumenical Jury. After starring in Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Zhang became a presence on the world stage. She later took main roles in Zhang Yimou’s Hero and House of Flying Daggers, both of which won her worldwide recognition.

Zhang Yimou’s later choices of leading actresses in his movies have all accorded with generally held ideals of feminine beauty and consequently helped generate high box-office returns.

Actresses Dong Jie, Li Man, Zhou Dongyu and Ni Ni are all blessed with unlined foreheads, clear eyes and irresistible feminine charm.

Heroes and Underdogs

Tang Guoqiang was a film idol in the 1970s and 80s, largely by virtue of his good looks that were well suited to the revolutionary roles he played. Since reaching middle age his parts have included Chairman Mao Zedong and ancient military strategists, each time displaying a profound understanding of these characters.