In August 2002, Isaac Mao, who worked at the Shanghai office of the chip maker Intel, was one of only a handful of people in China who had heard the word “blog”. A regular web surfer, he was fascinated by the freedom these online journals gave to ordinary people to publish both their own and their readers’ views online.

Surfing the US website blogger.com, Mao was thrilled to find Zheng Yunsheng, a teacher at a technical school in Fujian province. He left a message on Zheng’s blog, and two weeks later Mao and Zheng started CNBlog.org, China’s first online discussion forum about blogging technology and culture.

They soon gathered a small but devoted group of participants, many of whom went on to develop the technology that makes blogging possible for China’s half-a-million bloggers.

Dozens of arrests
Ever since the Communist party took power in 1949, the Chinese media has been tightly controlled by the government. Online publishing is a real threat to that control, and the government is clearly worried. A crackdown in 2003 closed websites and internet cafes and saw the arrest of dozens of online commentators.

Yet this is not proving enough to stifle the pluck and ingenuity of China’s bloggers. The rise of the blog phenomenon was made possible by blog-hosting services. Just as companies like Yahoo host email accounts, sites like blogger.com, based in the United States, host blogs.

Blogs usually allow room for readers’ comments, and because they often contain numerous links to other blogs and websites, they each act as a unit in a dynamic community. Together they form an interconnected whole – the “blogosphere”.

When Mao and Zheng started CNBlog.org, China had 67 million internet users. Today, it has more than 90 million, and most are hungry for information. The official China Internet Network Information Center in Beijing says 62% of internet users go online primarily to read news. Internet cafes are spreading rapidly throughout China, even in rural areas, largely thanks to official efforts to promote technology and improve the country’s economic competitiveness.

Great Firewall of China
But the government also fears that uncontrolled online information will cause the regime to collapse. Since 2000 China’s police force has established internet departments in more than 700 cities and provinces.

The net police monitor websites and email for “heretical teachings or feudal superstitions” and information “harmful to the dignity or interests of the state”. Since 2002, all internet service providers have had to sign a self-censorship pledge before they can operate.

Perhaps the most effective component of government control is the “Great Firewall”, which protects the nine gateways connecting China to the global internet. Its main function is to prevent surfers in China from accessing “undesirable” web content.

Research at the Berkman Center at Harvard University has found that blocked sites include overseas Chinese-language news websites, such as BBC Chinese, and most news sites originating in Taiwan and Hong Kong; and religious and human-rights websites such as Falun Gong and Amnesty International USA.

But things were starting to change when Mao began his grass-roots publishing effort. Technology writer Fang Xingdong in Beijing, who made his name with a book criticising Microsoft’s business in China, started a news and commentary website, BlogChina.com, which covers the development of China’s IT industry.

Zero cost
Fang coined the Chinese term bo ke to mean blogger. He encouraged his readers to try blogging by registering on blogger.com. “Blogging is a true revolution,” he wrote. “One needs zero technology training, zero institution and zero cost to become a blogger.”

By January 2003, China had about 2000 bloggers when, without warning, the Chinese government blocked all access to blogspot.com, the server that hosts all blogs registered on blogger.com.

The net police do not make the reasons for such actions public, but Chinese bloggers point out that DynaWeb, an anti-censorship service run by overseas Chinese, had been using a blog on blogspot.com to publish proxy server addresses that allowed users to get around the Great Firewall. The authorities’ blanket blockade affected all China’s bloggers, leaving them suddenly unable to reach their journals.

The censors probably did not anticipate the bloggers’ response. For many, blogging had become an addictive activity. With nowhere else to go, many followed Mao’s lead and started to look for solutions inside China.

Three small start-ups offered them a refuge; Blogcn.com, Blogdriver.com and Blogbus.com. All were blog-hosting services started just a couple of months earlier by people who had first gathered on Mao’s website. All were based inside China, and inside the Great Firewall.

Banning “truth”
At first, the new companies attracted little attention from the government. In early 2003, most Chinese who wanted to comment online were using not blogs, but online forums like bulletin boards and chat rooms. These allowed people to express themselves anonymously and therefore safely, and were already beginning to have a social impact.

But there is a catch. Whether in China or elsewhere, such sites are usually moderated by editors who keep them relevant and readable. In China, the moderators also keep their sites’ content acceptable to the censor, so when users try to post a “forbidden” comment they receive a warning message such as “your post contains sensitive and indecent contents”.

Posts on politically sensitive topics, such as Falun Gong, human rights, democracy, and Taiwan independence, are routinely filtered by this means. A list recently obtained by the China Internet Project in Berkeley found that over 1000 words, including “dictatorship”, “truth”, and “riot police” are automatically banned in China’s online forums.

This type of censorship is part of the wider internet crackdown that intensified in 2003. Dozens of people who published politically provocative articles online were arrested.

The net police closed almost half of the country’s 200,000 internet cafes, and installed surveillance software in the rest. In Liaoning province, where 40% of the people who go online do so in internet cafes, software was installed in 7000 cafes to track track web users’ online movements and keep records of their names, addresses and ID numbers.

Sex diary
In this stifling atmosphere, it was hard to see how the nascent blogosphere could possibly grow and develop. But over the next few months, the concept of blogging received a boost from an unexpected source.

A magazine writer in Guangzhou in southern China, who wrote under the name Mu Zimei, began keeping a sex diary on blogcn.com. “I have a job that keeps me busy, and in my spare time I have a very humanistic hobby – making love,” she wrote. “The partner I take in my hobby is one I choose and always changes. I rely on a large supply pool. I do not need to take any responsibility for them; neither should I give them love. They will not cause me problems. They are like CDs, which will not make a sound unless I play them.”

With explicit details and sometimes even publishing real names, Mu Zimei’s sex diary was a hit. By mid-November 2003, more than 160,000 people had logged on to her site and the number was growing by 6000 a day. While her explicit writing and lifestyle challenged traditional morals, causing heated debate in the Chinese media, Mu Zimei also made bo ke a familiar word for hundreds of millions of people.

As the Mu Zimei debates raged, the number of users on blogcn.com leapt from 20,000 to 160,000. Other blog sites saw similar increases.

Avoiding censorship
Blog services are now sprouting all over China. By the end of October 2004, China had more than 45 large blog-hosting services. A Google search for bo ke will return more than two million results, from blogs for football fans to blogs for Christians.

And while the larger hosting companies have become subject to censorship regulations, smaller companies and individuals do not face the same pressures. Any tech-savvy user can download and install blogging software themselves, bypassing the controls.

Blogs play an important role in republishing and spreading information as quickly as it is banned from official websites. One example of this played out in September when China’s most influential bulletin board, Yitahutu, was closed down by the net police. Unlike other online forums, Yitahutu was moderated by its users, who voted to decide which post should appear on the front page.

Without a moderator to blame for comments they did not like, the censors reacted by closing down the entire site. By that time the site had more than 300,000 registered users and 700 discussion forums, including many on politically sensitive topics such as Taiwan, anti-corruption, legal reform and human rights.

After the closure, all the major university bulletin boards were instructed to delete any discussion of the event. Even the name of the site was censored from Chinese search engines.

Finding euphemisms
But the net police found it much harder to purge discussion of Yitahutu’s closure in the blogosphere. Bloggers are quick to find euphemisms so that they can continue conversation despite keyword filtering. And most blogs have so many entries that it is easy for an individual to post an occasional provocative comment without being detected.

Two days after Yitahutu’s closure, He Weifang, a prominent law professor at Peking University, where the forum was founded, wrote an open letter to the university’s president, urging him to defend the site on the basis of freedom of expression.

His letter was removed from the major online forums after one day, but in that short time it had spread through the blogosphere. There are simply too many blogs for authorities to block them all.

The potential of blogs to act as news sources is relished by some Chinese bloggers. One site, Chinanewsman.net, founded by journalist and programmer Li Zhaohui, is a haven for news that is banned from the official media. Within its first five months of operation, Chinanewsman was closed repeatedly, forcing Li to switch internet service provider six times.

But it survived, and now hosts around 5000 blogs kept by journalists. Some of the information is available only to registered users who join by invitation. This mechanism has protected the site, probably because the censors are, in general, more tolerant of these semi-private spaces.

Naming
The original name of QQ was OICQ (believed to have meant either Open ICQ or Oh, I seek you). However, because of the possible trademark infringement with another popular real time communications service (ICQ), it was changed to QQ.
Usage
It is estimated that there are over 160 million QQ users in China.[citation needed] But because many users own two or more IDs it is hard to know the exact user amount. As of 5 March 2005, there are an average of 9 million people online at any one time on the Mainland China server.

Outside of China, QQ usage is extremely limited, except in South Africa, where it has been used for at least two or three years and has inspired a song by local band The Finkelsteins called “QQ Me”. QQ is used by people who want to communicate with people inside those countries. Examples include expatriates, international students and people studying Chinese.

After the 2006 Hengchun earthquake, trans-Pacific undersea cables were damaged, and many Chinese switched to QQ due to the unavailability of other options.

The domain qq.com attracted at least 1.6 million visitors annually by 2008 according to a Compete.com survey.
History
Tencent was founded in Shenzhen, China in November, 1998. Tencent’s instant messaging service platform, “QQ,” was formally launched in February 1999. After years of strong business growth, on July 16, 2004, Tencent Holdings Limited (SEHK 700) went public on the main board of Hong Kong Stock Exchange. On October 3rd, 2007 Tencent launched its first expansion into the American market with QQ Games.
Development
QQ was initially developed by Tencent Inc. in February 1999. It was first released as a “Network Paging” real time communications service. Then other features were successively added such as chatrooms, games, personal avatars (similar to “Meebo” in MSN), internet storage, and internet dating services. Most of these features were free. Its variety of features and easy-to-use interface made it very popular, especially among teenage users. In a few short years it was the most popular real time communications service in China.

The current version of QQ is QQ2008 Beta1. Tencent periodically releases special versions of QQ to coincide with events such as the Olympics or Chinese New Year.

The official client runs on Microsoft Windows and a beta public version were launched for Mac, but Linux users can talk to friends on the QQ network by installing Pidgin (previously Gaim) which comes installed with a plugin for QQ. The web version, which makes use of Ajax, is currently in Beta[4].

 
User Interface of Tencent MessengerIn response to competition with Windows Live Messenger, Tencent released Tencent Messenger, which is targeted to business people. It also provides, in limited form, features that are only available to premium members in normal QQ.
Membership
QQ currently allows free registration for membership. In 2002, Tencent had stopped its free membership registration, requiring all new members to pay a fee. However, free registration was reopened in 2003 due to pressure from other instant messaging services such as Windows Live Messenger and Sina UC. Tencent currently offers a premium membership scheme, which offers features such as mobile QQ, ringtone downloads and SMS sending/receiving. In addition, Tencent offers Diamond noble memberships. Currently, there are six diamond services available:

Red, for the QQ show service.
Yellow, for the Qzone service which is similar to a blog.
Blue, which is for QQ games.
Purple, which is shared between two tencent games, QQ r2beat, a korean music game, and QQ tang, an action game, extremely similar to crazy arcade.
Pink, for QQ pet, a small desktop game about raising a pet. So far there are 3 generations of pets. Penguin, Pig, and Bear (Beta testing).
Green, for QQ music, which is a software for listening to music directly from the Tencent server. Requiring no pre-download and sometimes consuming a lot of disk space due to caching.
VIP, for chat, beta test things, no advertising and some more

Merchandise
Tencent taken advantage of the popularity of the QQ brand, and have set up many Q-Gen stores selling QQ branded merchandise such as bags, watches, clothing as well as toy penguins.
Controversies and criticisms
QQ has faced many criticisms and controversies. Many users complain QQ provides fewer and fewer free services and an annoying number of ads.
Adware classification
Because of QQ’s extensive use of advertisements and processes related to ads, it has been branded as malicious adware by many anti-virus and anti-spyware vendors.
Keyword filtering
On August 2004, QQ Games began filtering keywords such as “钓鱼岛” (Diaoyu Islands) and “保钓” (Movement to protect the Diaoyu Islands). This act caused much controversy and Tencent has since lifted the filter.
QQ real group name scheme
On July 21, 2005, Tencent announced its intention to follow orders set by Shenzhen Police and enforce the requirement of real names for all the administrators and founders of QQ Groups. This caused much controversy on whether it can prevent the spread of pornographic and other indecent messages, or whether it intrudes on one’s privacy. However, the difficulty of enforcement made the real name registration optional.
Plagiarism
Like most IM clients, Tencent QQ has been known to copy its competitors’ features. The interface of early version of Tencent messenger was almost identical to ICQ, but as it developed, it started to look more like Windows Live Messenger. The interface of QQ is Luna themed. In addition to interfaces, QQ has also been known to copy code and text from its competitors. For example, one release contained Skype’s EULA, allegedly as an April Fools’ Day joke.
Resource usage
The resources required to run QQ have increased substantially since it was first released, which has caused some people to turn to third party “lite” versions. Pidgin, a free alternative to proprietary instant messenging clients, supports the QQ protocol.
QQ Coin
 
A stats display window with all services (icons) turned on and leveling info included.The QQ coin is a virtual currency used by QQ users to “purchase” QQ related items for their avatar and blog. QQ Coins are obtained either by purchase, one coin for one RMB, or for using the mobile phone service. Due to the popularity of QQ in Chinese young population, QQ coins are now accepted by gradually more and more online stores and gaming sites in exchange for “real” merchandise such as small gifts, and raised the concern of replacing (and thus “inflating”) real currency in these transactions. The People’s Bank of China, China’s central bank, says it is investigating the possibility of cracking down on QQ coin, due to people using QQ Coins in exchange for real world goods. Tencent claims the QQ coin was merely a regular commodity, and thus not a currency.

Modifications
Coral QQ, a modification of Tencent QQ, is a popular add on. While Tencent charges for some services and displays advertisement, Coral QQ, provides free access to some of the services and blocks Tencent’s advertisements. In 2006, Tencent filed a copyright lawsuit against Chen Shoufu (aka Soff), the author of Coral QQ, whose redistributing modified Tencent QQ was ruled illegal. Chen then published his modification as a separate add on. On August 16, 2007, Chen was detained again for allegedly making profits off his ad-blocking add on[13]. His case is pending at Shenzhen Nanshan district court.

Most of the technologies that are unique to the Internet require communication to be done in text—letters with some symbols and punctuation. Communicating effectively involves taking the time, except in informal communications, to use correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation and writing an appropriate message. When replying to a message include the pertinent parts of the message and use an appropriate and interesting subject header in any case.

When you’re communicating on the Internet take special care not to give out personal information to strangers and to treat others with respect. Be aware of the risks involved in communicating with people you cannot see and may never meet in person. Take time to consider what you write to others, and be careful to avoid humor and sarcasm except with the best of friends. You can’t assume that your messages are private, so be careful about what you write.

Several issues related to ethical and legal considerations arise from using the Internet for communication. The manner in which communication is implemented on the Internet makes it susceptible to monitoring. You can’t assume that communications are private. Some believe that sending email is like sending a message on a postcard. Some laws have been enacted to help protect privacy during electronic communications. These, however, have been difficult to enforce and are rarely applied. One way to protect privacy is to encrypt or code a message. A common way of encrypting messages is through the use of public and private keys. Although software for encryption is readily available, current policies and laws prohibit its export.

Another area of concern is dealing with abusive or offensive communications. Laws that apply to libel, harassment, and abuse have been applied to cases where the offending behavior has occurred on the Internet. Unsolicited email or other forms of communication is called spam. It definitely is an annoyance, but also quite costly to the people who receive the junk email or other communications. It’s relatively inexpensive to produce, because most of the cost of transporting the email is shifted to the receiver and all people that use the networks supporting the Internet.

Mandarin-speaking users in reportedly more than 40 countries can call their local Mobivox access number to reach the IVR and enter the number they want to call. They can also enter the name of a registered contact using the phone’s keypad, if they have previously entered the name on their Mobivox registration site. Chinese-written names can be entered through Pinyin.

Registered users in China, where there is currently no local access number, can also access free or low-cost calling by using Mobivox SMS or Web Call Back features. Users will first receive a call from Mobivox, which will then connect their call to the contact or number of their choice.

Registration to Mobivox is free. Calls between registered members are also free to more than 40 countries, and calls to non-members start at 1.9 cents per minute.

Mobivox worked with Welocalize, a globalisation firm, for the English-to-Chinese translation and localisation of the service.

MOBIVOX Introduces

“Call Me” Button Acts Like a Toll-Free Number While Keeping Your Phone Number Private

Reinforcing its commitment to making international calling easier, MOBIVOX announced today the launch of its new “Call Me” button.

MOBIVOX members simply place the Call Me button into their e-mail signatures or onto social network profiles, blogs, auction sites and other Web pages, enabling them to receive calls from around the world, while keeping their phone numbers private.

“Call Me enables members to keep in contact no matter where they are or what they’re doing,” said Darren Yaphe, Director of Marketing for MOBIVOX. “The Call Me button is one of many features that we are developing to make the service more versatile. Our goal is to make free, or low cost, international calling easier and more accessible through a wide range of communications tools—not only mobile phones, but also social media, e-mail and other Web sites where information is exchanged.

How Call Me Works

When the Call Me button is clicked, a Call Me page appears containing an online form to initiate the call to the Mobivox member. The Call Me button then seamlessly connects the call after the Mobivox member has been identified as being available. The Call Me button also acts like a toll-free number for the call initiator. This benefits the Mobivox members by providing them with an inexpensive and manageable method for their contacts to reach them at a fraction of the cost of a typical toll-free number service.

Not only does the Call Me button keep the member’s phone number hidden, but members can also configure the button to direct calls to an alternate number. Yaphe explains, “When I am in Montreal, I configure my button to call me at the office, whereas when I am traveling, I can direct it to my mobile phone. It essentially follows me wherever I am.” The button can also be configured to restrict certain calls and can be activated or deactivated at will.

The winner in the Chinese 3G game will be the one who is best able to retain the high spender.  TD-SCDMA, being an untested technology, will initially face constraints.  Its 3G market share expected in 2006 at 10 percent should expand to nearly a quarter by 2010.

Operators Prepare for 3G Challenge  
At YE2005, comments from Mr. Wang Xudong of the Minister of Information Industry (MII) raised expectations that the much delayed 3G licenses will be announced this year.    His official stance became more credible when it was subsequently announced that pre-commercial trials for the local 3G standard, TD-SCDMA will be held this month.  With a three to six months trial period, it is possible that 3G could be deployed in 2H2006.  For the sake of discussion, we will ignore the possibility that TD-SCDMA, will be deployed ahead of WCDMA and CDMA2000.  This is not a critical distinction because we believe the challenger will still go for bundling and we do not expect a large time lag between TD-SCDMA and WCDMA/CDMA2000 deployments.

The Challenger Has Triple/Quadruple Play Advantage 
Pyramid Research believes the two major fixed operators, China Telecom (CT) and China Netcom (CNC), will operate a joint TD-SCDMA in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangdong.  Whether TD-SCDMA has a head start in the market or not, we believe CT and CNC will still need to entice subscribers to try out a new 3G standard and a new operator.  A sure-fire method to bait new customers from their existing customer base is to tie in 3G services with broadband and/or PHS and fixed telephony.  The types of customers CT and CNC will be looking to target belong to two categories.  The first is the broadband user who is already a higher ARPU contributor than a PHS subscriber.  By tying broadband packages and 3G services together, CT and CNC can make their proposition attractive.  The second customer profile is the PHS subscriber who is already increasingly looking at PHS VAS, such as SMS and ringtone downloads.  The approach to price sensitive PHS customers will be to ensure that 3G applications are attractively priced.  We expect TD-SCDMA to initially only take up 10 percent of total 3G subscribers in the first year or less than 0.5 percent of total population in the three regions, growing to 5 percent by 2010

China Mobile is an Innovative Leader  
China Mobile is now the undisputed market leader in mobile communications.  Its greatest trump card lies in a well-run operation that is capable of going to market rapidly, ensuring customer satisfaction and relative brand loyalty.  With 3G, China Mobile’s strategy will be in customized handsets 3G users can easily access.  Already, China Mobile has a popular Montenet, a platform on which users can access mobile applications.  For at least the last twelve months, China Mobile has centralized management of content and service providers, taking a spring cleaning of preferred partners.  In this way, China Mobile provides a similar i-mode approach for customers to access mobile data.  This will have a strong conceptual pull to a customer shopping around for a 3G service provider.  We also believe China Mobile will be reluctant to take the low-end route like TD-SCDMA because its value proposition lies in leading edge applications with fancy handsets.  Since China Mobile is the market leader, a non-price differentiation approach can reap results.  As such, we believe China Mobile will gain 60 percent of total 3G market in the three regions in the first year of operation.  By 2008, China Mobile will still remain the market leader with 50 percent of market share.  Anything less would not be acceptable, as China Mobile is the official sponsor of 2008 Olympics. 

China Unicom Has Data Applications Expertise  
China Unicom would have a three to six months head start over China Mobile if we assume it will operate CDMA2000 network.  We mentioned last year that China Unicom can learn how to sustain its gains from SK Telecom.  SK Telecom’s portfolio of traffic intensive value-added services (VAS) on its CDMA-based network and the introduction of attractive pricing have helped it achieve critical mass to achieve efficiencies and sustainable ARPS.  At only about 10 percent, China Unicom can aspire to these levels if it also correctly identifies the various segments to introduce new services.  Another important success factor for China Unicom is the value chain, an issue that SK Telecom has addressed early in the game.  China Unicom’s disappointing January performance was due to too few CDMA handsets to meet customer demand.  Bottlenecks on the terminal end still persist, and this is an important issue that China Unicom is addressing.  

 Zhang Yimou is an internationally acclaimed director working in China. He was born in Xi’an, in Shaanxi Province.Zhang Yimou graduated in the fifth class of the Beijing Film Academy in 1982.Zhang and his co-graduates were assigned to small inland studios, and as a cinematographer, he began working for the Guangxi Film Studio. His first work, One and Eight (as director of photography), was made in 1984. Zhang’s next collaboration, with fellow graduate Chen Kaige, the latter acting as director, was to be one of the defining Chinese films of the 1980s, Yellow Earth (1984). This is widely considered the inaugural film for the Chinese Fifth Generation directors that were apart of an artistic reemergence in China after the end of the Cultural Revolution. Zhang continued to work with Chen for the latter’s next film, The Big Parade (1985). Their collaboration was one of the most fruitful of the Fifth Generation period.In 1987 Zhang embarked on his directorial debut, Red Sorghum, starring Chinese actress Gong Li, handpicked by Zhang, in her first leading role. Released to widespread critical acclaim, Red Sorghum catapulted Zhang into the forefront of the world’s art directors, winning him the Golden Bear for Best Picture at the 1988 Berlin Film Festival. Its rich, earthy visual style of narrative storytelling came to be the hallmark of Zhang’s early films.In 1989, Zhang began work on a drama Ju Dou. Starring Gong Li as the titular main character, along with Li Baotian in the male leading role, Ju Dou was an early example of Zhang’s unique use of colors and lush cinematography and female-centered films. The picture garnered as much critical acclaim in film circles as his Red Sorghum and became China’s first entry to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.Fresh after the success of Ju Dou, Zhang began work on what has been considered by many as his magnum opus, Raise the Red Lantern. Based on novelist Su Tong’s book Wives and Concubines, the film depicted the realities of life in a rich family compound during the 1920s. Gong Li was again featured in the leading role, her fourth collaboration with director Zhang. With a unique filmmaking style characterized by highly intense scenes through controlled, formalized color photography, Raise the Red Lantern was Zhang’s most personal effort to this point.The film was released in its home country in 1991 to immediate political controversy, due to officials fearing that the story would be taken as an allegory against Chinese communist authoritarianism. Although the screenplay had been approved by censors prior to shooting, the film itself was initially banned from theatrical release in China.The Story of Qiu Ju (1992) marked a significant change in direction for Zhang. Employing a far lighter tone and generous touches of everyday humor, Zhang used non-professional actors together with his long-time collaborator Gong Li to achieve a neorealist effect in telling a tale of Chinese peasantry waddling through ineffective bureaucracy. It was also released to critical praise, winning the Golden Lion for Best Picture at the 1992 Venice International Film Festival.Subsequently, Zhang directed To Live, an epic film based on an acclaimed novel by Yu Hua. To Live highlighted the resilience of the ordinary Chinese folks, personified by its two leads, amidst three generations of historical upheavals throughout Chinese politics of the 20th century. The longest of his films to date, it was released at the 1994 Cannes Film Festival and won the Grand Jury Prize, as well as a Best Actor prize for Ge You.Having received international recognition for his earlier works, Zhang completed a major phase of his directorial work with the period gangster drama Shanghai Triad. The film, which was released in 1995, featured leading actress Gong Li in her seventh film under Zhang’s direction. The two had previously formed the basis for their professional collaboration behind an ongoing romantic relationship. However, this would end during production of Shanghai Triad, and Zhang and Gong would not work together again for a decade.1997 saw the release of Keep Cool, a small-scale film about life in modern China. After its release, Zhang found his new leading lady in the form of the young actress Zhang Ziyi. His 1999 film The Road Home, featuring Zhang Ziyi in her film debut, is a simple throw-back narrative centering around a love story between the narrator’s parents. As in The Story of Qiu Ju, Zhang returned to the neorealist habit of employing non-professional actors and location shooting for the companion piece in Not One Less (1999), which won the Golden Lion prize at the Venice International Film Festival for the second time.Happy Times, a relatively minor film by Zhang, represented his second foray into modern Chinese city life. A seriocomic drama starring popular Chinese actor Zhao Benshan and actress Jie Dong, it was an official selection for the Berlin International Film Festival in 2002.Zhang’s next major project was the ambitious wuxia drama Hero (2002). The film was a major change in direction for Zhang, as it represented his first foray into epic filmmaking. Boasting an impressive lineup of Asian stars, including Jet Li, Maggie Cheung, Tony Leung Chiu-Wai, Zhang Ziyi, and Donnie Yen, Hero introduced a fictional tale revolving around Ying Zheng, the king of the State of Qin (later the first Emperor of Qin) and his would-be assassins. The film became a huge international hit and, with the intervention of American director Quentin Tarantino, was released in North America two years after its Chinese release after being shelved by American distributor Miramax Films. Hero became one of the few foreign-language films to debut at #1 at the U.S. box office, and was one of the nominees for Best Foreign Language Film at the 2003 Academy Awards.Zhang followed up the huge success of Hero with another martial arts epic, House of Flying Daggers, in 2004. Set in the Tang Dynasty of China, it starred Zhang Ziyi, Andy Lau, and Takeshi Kaneshiro as characters caught in a dangerous love triangle. House of Flying Daggers was generally received well among critics, who noted the flamboyant use of color that harked back to some of Zhang’s earlier works. However, compared to Hero, it was a more modest international success.Released in China in 2005, Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles was a return to the more low-key drama that characterized much of Zhang’s middle period pieces. The film stars legendary Japanese actor Ken Takakura, who wishes to repair relations with his alienated son, eventually led by circumstance to set out on a journey to China. Zhang claims that he had been an admirer of Takakura for over thirty years, and as such has fulfilled his own wish of working with the Japanese veteran on a film project. Zhang produced The First Emperor, an opera by Tan Dun (composer of the soundtrack for Hero and other wuxia films), which had its world premiere at the Metropolitan Opera on 21 December 2006.In 2007, Zhang cast Gong Li, Jay Chou, and Chow Yun-Fat in his epic Curse of the Golden Flower.

As director

As cinematographer

  As actor

Nationality: Chinese. Born: Beijing, 12 August 1952

Education:

Sent to work on a rubber plantation in Yunnan province to “learn from the people,” as part of the  Cultural Revolution, 1967; attended the Beijing Film Academy.

Career:

His films are known for their visual flair and epic storytelling. His first movie, Yellow Earth (1984), is one of his most famous and important works. Together with Zhang Yimou as cinematographer, the film established itself as one of the most important works of Fifth Generation filmmaking; though simple, its powerful visual imagery and elliptical storytelling style strongly influenced contemporary Chinese filmmaking. The Big Parade (1986) and King of Children (1987) expanded on his filmic vocabulary and are often seen together with Yellow Earth as an early informal trilogy.^{[citation needed]} Early in 1989, he did further experimenting in a music video for the song “Do You Believe In Shame” by Duran Duran. Later that year, he made Life on a String, a highly esoteric movie which uses mythical allegory and lush scenery to tell the story of a blind er-hu musician and his student.His most famous film in the West, Farewell My Concubine (1993), nominated for two Academy Awards and winner of the Palme d’Or at Cannes Film Festival, follows two Beijing opera stars through decades of change in China during the twentieth century. Chen followed up the unprecedented success of Farewell My Concubine with Temptress Moon (1996), another period drama starring Gong Li. Though it was well received by most critics, it did not achieve the accolades that Concubine did, and many were put off by the film’s convoluted plot line. Almost as famous is his The Emperor and the Assassin (1999), an epic involving the legendary King of Qin and the reluctant assassin who aims to kill him. But Kaige doesn’t limit himself to epics, in 2002, Chen made his first, and to-date only English-language film, Killing Me Softly, a thriller starring Heather Graham and Joseph Fiennes, though it proved to be both a critical and popular disappointment. His more recent Together (2002) is an intimate film about a young violinist and his father. In 2005, he directed The Promise, which sees him returning to the historical epic.Chen has also acted in several films, including Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor (1987) and his own The Emperor and the Assassin and Together.

Awards:

Berlin Film Festival Best Film and Locarno International Film Festival Silver Leopard, for Yellow Earth, 1984;

Istanbul International Film Festival Golden Tulip, for Life on a String, 1991;

Best Film (not in the English language) British Academy Award, Cannes Film Festival Golden Palm (tied with The Piano), and FIPRESCI Award, for Farewell My Concubine, 1993;

Cannes Film Festival Technical Grand Prize, for The Emperor and the Assassin, 1999.

Personal Life

In 1989, he married Huang Hung, a graduate of Vassar College. They divorced later. In 1996, he married actress Chen Hong.

Filmography  

 

Year	English Title	Chinese Title	Notes
1984	Yellow Earth	黃土地
1986	The Big Parade	大阅兵
1987	King of Children	孩子王
1991	Life on a String	边走边唱
1993	Farewell My Concubine	霸王别姬	1993 Palme d’Or winner at the Cannes Film Festival
1996	Temptress Moon	风月
1999	The Emperor and the Assassin	荊柯刺秦王
2002	Killing Me Softly
2002	100 Flowers Hidden Deep		Segment in the anthology film Ten Minutes Older: The Trumpet
2002	Together	和你在一起	2002 Silver Seashell for Best Director at the San Sebastián International Film Festival
2005	The Promise	无极
2007	Zhanxiou Village		Vignette in the anthology film To Each His Cinema
2008	Mei Lanfang	梅兰芳	In production

 

 

As actor  

Year	English Title	Chinese Title	Role	Notes
1987	The Last Emperor		Captain of Imperial Guard
1999	The Emperor and the Assassin	荊柯刺秦王	Lü Buwei
2002	Together	和你在一起	Yu Shifeng

  

 

Year	English Title	Chinese Title	Notes
1984	Yellow Earth	黃土地
1991	Life on a String	边走边唱
1996	Temptress Moon	风月
1999	The Emperor and the Assassin	荊柯刺秦王
2002	Together	和你在一起
2005	The Promise	无极

 

As producer  

Year	English Title	Chinese Title	Notes
2002	Together	和你在一起

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A 21st Century American teenager takes a spellbinding, dangerous journey into martial arts legend in the new action/adventure epic FORBIDDEN KINGDOM. Shot on location in China, THE FORBIDDEN KINGDOM marks the historic first-ever onscreen pairing of martial arts superstars Jackie Chan (RUSH HOUR, DRUNKEN MASTER) and Jet Li (FEARLESS, ONCE UPON A TIME IN CHINA), and features the awe-inspiring action choreography of Wo Ping (THE MATRIX, CROUCHING TIGER HIDDEN DRAGON). While hunting down bootleg kung-fu DVDs in a Chinatown pawnshop, Jason (played by Michael Angarano – “24”, “Will and Grace,” LORDS OF DOGTOWN, SEABISCUIT) makes an extraordinary discovery that sends him hurtling back in time to ancient China. There, Jason is charged with a monumental task: he must free the fabled warrior the Monkey King, who has been imprisoned by the evil Jade Warlord. Jason is joined in his quest by wise kung fu master Lu Yan (Jackie Chan) and a band of misfit warriors including Silent Monk (Jet Li). But only by learning the true precepts of kung fu can Jason hope to succeed – and find a way to get back home.

FILM OFFICIAL WEBSITE: http://www.forbiddenkingdommovie.com/main.html