Maggie Cheung
Maggie Cheung (actually: Cheung Man Yuk -, Chinese张曼玉, Pinyin Zhang Manyu, born September 20, 1964 in Hong Kong) is a Chinese actress who was best known for character roles.
Life
1972 drew Maggie Cheung at the age of eight with her family to England. She lived in a small town in the county of Kent, where she went to school. She felt in England never quite well, also because she was the only Asian girl at her school. In addition, she was bored the rather quiet and predominantly rural life in Kent.
At 17, she returned to Hong Kong. There, she worked as a model and appeared in commercials. In 1983, she won the second place of the beauty contest Miss Hong Kong. It was the starting point for her film career.
Maggie Cheung has lived since 2007 with her partner, Ole Scheeren, the architect, in Beijing.
Career
Since 1984, she starred in more than 80 films of different genres ( Comedy, Wuxia, Thriller, Drama ) and turned up to six films a year. Although she enjoyed no formal acting training, she is considered one of the best character actresses of Hong Kong cinema. She won numerous awards at film festivals.
Her first film, Behind the Yellow Line in 1984, the criticism was not particularly impressed. The breakthrough was a movie star she had with her role as a friend of Jackie Chan in Police Story of 1985.
In the film, As Tears Go By ( 1989) by Wong Kar- Wai she could show her acting skills for the first time. She played Ah Ngor, which for her cousin, the gangster Wah, love. In Wong's film Days of Being Wild she could fall in love with the heartbreaker Yuddy (Leslie Cheung).
In the 90s, Maggie Cheung played with in many wuxia films, including The Iceman Cometh (1989 ), New Dragon Gate Inn (1992 ) Heroic Trio ( 1993), Green Snake (1993) and Ashes of Time (1994, also by Wong Kar-Wai ). However, in contrast to Michelle Yeoh has no ambition to perform stunts and fights herself. She has stated on several occasions that she was gedoubled in most action scenes of these films.
Maggie Cheung sees himself more as a character actress. When they could choose in the second half of the 90s because of their celebrity, the roles themselves, they preferred especially dramas, such as Comrades, almost a love story (1996). In this film she plays Qiao - Li, an immigrant from the People's Republic of China, which is unfortunate, Xiao -Jun Li (played by Leon Lai ) in love, who also emigrated from China to Hong Kong. Chinese Box of 1997 deals with a similar theme. This film is a love story that takes place before the backdrop of the handover of Hong Kong to the PRC in 1997.
In the French film Irma Vep (1996 ) Maggie Cheung plays himself in the film plot is they cast of the fictional director Rene Vidal to be in a remake of the silent film serial Les Vampires (1915, directed by Louis Feuillade ) to play the lead role. This occurs, then no, because Vidal suffers a nervous breakdown. This film by Olivier Assayas deals with the difficulties of a film production. Many dialogs is also about the differences between the more " superficial " Hong Kong cinema and the French Nouvelle Vague, which is shown here as old fashioned and antiquated.
Maggie Cheung and Olivier Assayas, director of Irma Vep of, were married in December 1998. The marriage lasted until May 2001.
In the following years she played only in a few films, such as in the award-winning work of Wong Kar- Wai, In the Mood for Love ( 2000). The film won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. In the Mood for Love plays in Hong Kong of the 60s. Director Wong wishes to enable the audience to a bygone time, to the time when he himself grew up in this city. Maggie Cheung plays Su Li -zhen, which attracts nearly simultaneously with the Zeitungsredakteuer Chow Mo -wan in an apartment of the Shanghai community. They soon discover that their respective spouses are having an affair. From disappointment or due to feelings of guilt they can even though they are attracted to each other but do not decide to also each other to live their emotions. More important than the plot of the film seems to be the melancholy mood produced by Wong Kar- Wai especially with cinematic means and a corresponding music.
In the Mood for Love was born without an exact script. The actors were asked to improvise according to the specifications of the director. Cheung felt it was very tiring. Since Wong constantly invaded new scenes and also because of other delays, the shooting lasted for more than two years.
In 2002, Cheung starred in the wuxia film Hero, the assassin Flying Snow. The film is set in the time of the Warring States Period. Other films followed, including Clean ( 2004), again by Olivier Assayas. For the portrait of a formerly drug-addicted rock star who is fighting for custody of his child, Maggie Cheung won the 2004 the first Asian actress the Best Actor Award at the Cannes Film Festival; she was also nominated for Best Actress for the French César. Her next film, again directed Wong Kar- Wai, 2046 (2004), was a continuation of In the Mood for Love.
2007 Maggie Cheung was appointed to the jury of the 60th Cannes Film Festival.
Awards (selection)
International Film Festival Berlin
- Best Actress, Silver Bear for Center Stage阮玲玉( Berlinale 1992)
International Film Festival of Cannes 2004
- Best Actress for Clean
Golden Horse Film Festival and Awards, Taipei, Taiwan
- Best Actress, Golden Horse Award for In the Mood for Love花样 年华(2000)
- Best Actress, Golden Horse Award for Comrades, Almost a Love Story甜蜜 蜜(1996 )
- Best Supporting Actor Golden Horse Award for Red Dust滚滚 红尘(1990 )
- Best Actress, Golden Horse Award for Full Moon in New York人 在 纽约(1989 )
Hong Kong Film Awards
- Best Actress, Hong Kong Film Award for In the Mood for Love花样 年华(2001)
- Best Actress, Hong Kong Film Award for The Soong Sisters宋家皇 朝(1998)
- Best Actress, Hong Kong Film Award for Comrades, Almost a Love Story甜蜜 蜜(1996 )
- Best Actress, Hong Kong Film Award for Center Stage阮玲玉(1993 )
- Best Actress, Hong Kong Film Award for Farewell China爱 在 他乡 的 季节(1991 )
- Best Actress, Hong Kong Film Award for A Fishy Story不 脱 袜 的 人(1989 )
Filmography
HKE = English title of the film in Hong Kong, according to IMDB or other sources
* = Maybe not the official release title in English