"So since I cannot prove a lover ... I am determined to prove a villain" -- Richard III, Act I, Scene I
[right, Sun Min at the height of his career in the 1930s]
Sun Min(孙敏) was born in 1905 in Wuxi, Jiangsu, birth name Sun Xikang (孙锡康). While nothing is recorded of his early life, we do know that in the early 1920s he was a college student, and like so many other young people of his generation, was imbued with the spirit of the May 4th Movement and its objective to reform and strengthen China. So when the young student read a newspaper ad recruiting students for a Shanghai film school, he made a decision to leave college and go to Shanghai where he successfully tested into the Zhonghua Film Company's school. After graduating in 1926, he had roles in a series of films for several studios, but without making much impact, and not really becoming a fixture anywhere. His longest period with one studio was in 1929-32, when he appeared in more than 10 films for Tianyi, but in 1932 he was again let go. With his matinee idol good looks, Sun had naturally been cast as romantic leading men. Critics liked his acting, he was popular and respected among his peers in the Shanghai movie community, and like all of China's screen stars, he received his fair share of fan letters. So what was the problem? Basically, although he had some fans, a significant segment of the moviegoing public just didn't like him, even cursing him when they saw him. Since fans bought tickets to see stars they liked and admired, he did nothing to attract customers. In Hollywood terminology, Sun Min was "box office poison".
Unlike his contemporary Wang Xianzhai, China's master of on-screen villainy, Sun Min had not been portraying nasty characters; in fact, his characters were usually the exact opposite. They might be weak, or act foolishly at times, but they were not bad men. It seemed there was just something about him some people didn't like, too many people anyway. As discouraging as this was, he also regarded the movies he had made to be trivialities of no lasting consequence, not at all the important and serious films the idealistic young man had originally aspired to make. At this nadir in his career, Sun poured out his discontent in a 1932 magazine article, and his unhappiness really comes across. (An English translation of the article is filed in our archives.)
Near the end of that same year, Sun Min moved to the Mingxing studio where things began to change for the better. As with Wang Xianzhai, the breakthrough came by accident. Mingxing had a film script which called for a villain younger than the ones Wang Xianzhai usually played, so the studio cast Sun in the part. Not only did he do well in the role, to his considerable surprise the actor found he liked this new (for him) character type. From then on, he was largely typecast, becoming Mingxing's second most prominent villain. Although Wang Xianzhai played every sort of bad guy, including thugs and gangsters, Sun Min's nasties were usually more subtle in their villainy, being seemingly honest and sincere young men who turned out to be smooth-talking connivers, false lovers, would-be seducers, etc. When he and Wang were in the same movie, as the plot unfolded it usually developed that he was consigliere to Wang Xianzhai's capo. But again unlike Wang, Sun did not completely abandon himself to malfeasance, still playing the occasional leading man as well as major supporting villain. It also satisfied his yearning to make more significant films, as in 1933's "Salt Tide", which severely criticized the growing foreign dominance of China's economy. Sun Min played a well-to-do and educated youth dazzling a trusting local girl with his social conscience, but actually working in league with the foreigners to sell out his own country. ("Salt Tide" was later suppressed because it also pointed out the foreigners would be powerless without the collusion of corrupt Chinese government officials.) But now he was contributing in a meaningful way, and as he explained in a 1943 magazine interview, "Movies that expose the shortcomings of society need somebody to create those problems". In other words, without villains there can be no heroes.
[left, in 'Salt Tide', Hu Die gets some unwanted attention from Sun Min, who she now knows to be a rascal]
Sun Min was inactive due to illness for most of 1936, but returned late in the year to make five more movies before the Japanese invasion shut down the Shanghai studios in mid-1937. He and his wife were among those in the film community who remained, and when some Shanghai studios were permitted to reopen in 1940, he resumed his acting career, making a series of films for the Xinhua, Yihua and Huaying studios. Ironically, although in nearly all of these he was once again the romantic lead, as in his early career, he was still typed in the public mind as a specialist in villainy: in that 1943 magazine interview, playing the heavy was all the reporter could ask about. Although that phase was now behind him, Sun Min accepted the questions in good grace, and when pressed for his thoughts on playing a villain, responded:
Toward the end of the war recurring health problems forced Sun into retirement for several years. He returned to make one more movie in 1948, after which he retired for good. Sun Min died in Shanghai in 1950, aged 45.
Sources:
China Cinema Encyclopaedia (Shanghai, 1995), p.907.
Sun, Min (孙敏) "Recalling how I got into movies" Film Art (电影艺术), v.1, no.3, July 22, 1932.
Jin, Xun. "Notes from a visit with Sun Min" Dazhong Yingxun (大众影讯) (Popular Film Dispatches) v.3, no.39, April 17, 1943.
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Sun Min Filmography (all as actor):
Embarassing Sister (1926)
Attack on Tangzhou (1927)
My Good Son (1927)
A Prostitute's Wish (1927)
The Person in Her Heart (1928)
Strange Knight (1928)
Spiders Group (1928)
A Clever Fool（1929）
The Burning of White Flower Temple, pts. I, II (1929)
The Great Robbers (1929)
College Queen I, II (1930)
Li Sanniang (1930)
Yang Naiwu and Xiao Baicai, pts. I, II, III (1930)
Yang Yunyou and Dong Qichang (1930)
Between Husband and Wife (1931)
It's Unlucky to be a Woman (1931)
Emperor Qian Long Tours the South, part 8 (1931)
Emperor Qian Long Tours the South, part 9 (1931)
Shanghai Girl Han Xiuxia (1931)
Yasen and Loping (1931)
The Girl Yunlan (1931)
Trace (1932)
One Night of Luxury (1932)
A Married Woman (1932)
Old Hatreds, New Resentments (1932)
The Fallen Girls (aka The Last Days of Spring) (1933)
Romance in the Spring (1933)
Oppression (1933)
The Future (aka Prospects) (1933)
A Modern Girl (1933)
Salt Tide （1933）
The Lin Family Shop （1933）
Cosmetics Market （1933）
A Brief Life (1934)
Women's Enemies (1934)
Three Sisters (1934)
Homesick (1934)
Big Family (1935)
Jadeite Horse (1935)
Down-trodden Peach Blossom (1935)
Nation's Soul (1935) (aka Loyal Heroes; aka Hot Blood and Faithful Hearts)
Night Blossom (1935)
Spring Flowers (1936)
Heaven and Earth in a Dream (1937)
Mother's Secrets (1937)
Four Daughters (1937)
Leaving at Midnight (1937)
Female Ghost (1940)
The Country Girl (1940)
Jade Butterfly (1940)
Life of the Red Rose (1941)
The Widow (1941
The Soul (1941)
A Woman's Heart (1941)
Two Lovers in the Fire (1941)
Fruits Without Flowers (1941)
Grand Hotel (1942)
A Joyful Night (1942)
Lover's Tears (1942)
The Beautiful Thief (1942)
Four Sisters (1942)
Yan Yingchun (1943)
A Wealthy Family (1943)
Vampire (1944)
Murder on a Foggy Night (1948)
