Chen Kaige
(b. 1952), Chinese film director. With his film Yellow Earth (1984), Chen Kaige was the first member of the acclaimed Fifth Generation of Chinese film directors to achieve international success. The Fifth Generation, who were graduates of the first class of the reopened Beijing Film Academy following the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976), came of age after the death of Mao Zedong (1893–1976) and reacted against the melodrama and didacticism of the Chinese film tradition. Yellow Earth contains gorgeous visuals similar to Chinese paintings. Deceptively simple with minimal dialogue and action, it is a multilayered examination of the impact of China's feudal culture and modern revolution on the peasants. Chen's next film to make a big international splash was Farewell My Concubine (1993), a lavish production set in the Beijing Opera of the twentieth century and dealing with the betrayal of art and love. It garnered the Palm d'Or prize at the Cannes Film Festival and other prizes. Chen's most recent film, The Emperor and the Assassin (1999), is a historical epic about Qin Shi Huangdi or Ying Zheng, the emperor who unified China in the third century BCE.
With the collapse of the state film industry in the 1990s, Chen and other filmmakers had to seek overseas financing for their projects. Domestic critics have accused them of pandering to Western taste and distorting Chinese realities. Chen, however, is an intensely personal artist who believes that the redemption of China lies in its cultural tradition.
Further Reading
Chen Kaige. (1990) "Breaking the Circle: The Cinema and Cultural Change in China." Cineaste 18, 3: 28–32.
Zha, Jianying. (1995) China Pop. New York: New Press.
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