Biography and Filmwork of Zhang Yimou

The article that I linked to by Mary Farquhar is a biography of Zhang Yimou. Farquhar explains that Zhang Yimou graduated from the Beijing Film Academy in 1982 and that his unique filmmaking style is generally referred to as the “Fifth Generation” where he and other directors including, Chen Kaige create films from the perspective of life in China. According to Farquhar, “Fifth Generation films continue Chinese cinema’s long preoccupation with China as a nation…these directors reject the politicized angst of national survival films in the first half of the 20th century and the class heroics of social realist cinema under Mao Zedong after 1949.” The article describes how Yimou’s own past became an influence for his filmmaking career. Yimou’s parents struggled financially as he was growing up. The hardships he and his family endured became the foundation for his films based on the socialism in China which clearly showed that the divisions among social classes played a large factor in one’s life.

The article also discusses how Yimou has directed numerous films, and he constantly desires to add a few minor changes to his overall style. For instance, Farquhar states that in Yimou’s two films, Judou and Raise the Red Lantern, Yimou uses the color red quite often. However, Yimou begins to experiment with his directing style in Hero where Farquhar explains how Yimou incorporates the “mythical aspects” of a film with martial arts. Another film where Yimou breaks away from the traditional Chinese formalistic features of a film is witnessed in One and Eight and Yellow Earth. Farquhar paraphrases Tony Rayns who believes that both of these films “deliberately break all the established Chinese rules, using de-centered compositions, real locations, and stark but stunning imagery to tell stories with minimal plot and ambiguous endings.” Farquhar goes on to provide a brief summary of Yimou’s other films and how his “Fifth Generation” style reflects Yimou’s beliefs about life in a socialist China by including the perspectives of both men and women such as in Red Sorghum and The Road Home. In conclusion, this biography about Zhang Yimou by Mary Farquhar emphasizes how Yimou focuses on how a socialist China impacts its citizens who desire to live worry-free from the confines of social structure.