Biography

Considered a leading figure of the "Sixth Generation" of Chinese directors.

During a press conference at the 61st Cannes Film Festival for Er shi si cheng ji (2008), Zhang Ke Jia, Joan Chen and Tao Zhao observed a minute of silence in memory of the victims of the 2008 devastating earthquake in China. The film was shot in Chengdu, in Sichuan province where the earthquake struck.

Member of the jury of BigScreen Italia Film Festival 2006, Kunming, Yunnan, China

As his grandfather had worked as a surgeon in Europe, the family was sent to Fenyang, a small rural town in the Shanxi province, where he was born.

Graduate, Beijing Film Academy, Dept. of Literature.

Those who strictly follow professional principles and exhaustively describe the marketing ability they possess have long lost their power of thought. They pay too much attention to wheter the film is good enough to reflect their professional competencies. For example, the picture should be as delicate as an oil-painting, or the mise-en-scené is supposed to match that of Antonioni's films; even the twinkling spotlight needs to be right on the face of the actor. They repeatedly fathom the professional mindset, cautioning themselves against any amateur act that breaks the established classic rules. Conscience and sincerity, which are crucial to filmmaking, are completely diluted by these facts.

[on making A Touch of Sin (2013) and the state of China] I slowly began to see the problem of individual violence in society. There are many tragedies or societal problems in which people in the end rebel, resulting in a very big tragedy. So I began to pay more and more attention to this problem, because, frankly speaking, I feel like Chinese people do not really understand the problem of violence because society has never had a widespread discussion of the problem.

Revolution is the cruelest of recollections for the Chinese people. The destructive effects of the previous revolution are still deeply felt. It wasn't that long ago that people were violent to each other in the name of communism. Now it's in the pursuit of capitalism.

We have no language to express these new troubles. In the past there would have been systems to give people a sense of meaning. There was potential to find spiritual fulfillment through Buddhism, or a place and support through the family. These traditional sources of personal meaning are gone, and they have been replaced by money - and violence.

We have a joke in China about why we don't have any legal dramas, and it's because no one believes in the legal system. It would be a fairy tale.