The Chinese Mirror

Zheng Jiduo (? - ?)

    Beyond his film credits, nothing is recorded concerning the life and career of Zheng Jiduo, except that
like his fellow actor Jin Yan, Zheng Jiduo 郑基锋 [Korean:  Chung Ki-Tak] was a Korean, although he never attained anything like Jin's movie fame.  Zheng Jiduo joined the Da Zhonghua Baihe studio in 1928 as an actor and director, specializing in action-adventure films.  When Ruan Lingyu joined the studio in 1929, he co-starred with her in three films.  Zheng's next few years are unrecorded:  although he was not among the many Da Zhonghua Baihe personnel who moved to the new Lianhua studio when it was formed by merger in 1930, Zheng did join Lianhua in 1933 to direct two films, the last in 1934 with Ruan as the female lead.  All of Zheng's films were silents, and while there is no hard evidence of it, it may have been that as a native speaker of another language, Zheng was a victim of advancing technology:  while Jin Yan had grown up in China and spoke flawless Mandarin, Zheng's language skills may have been insufficient to meet the demands of sound production.

Filmography:

1928:
Patriotic Souls                             (director, actor)
Three and One                            (director, actor)
Martian Blades                            (director)

1929:
Women Pirates                           (director, writer, actor)
Flowers of the Screen                 (director, actor)
Passion's Precious Mirror              (actor)

1930:
The Pearl Cap                            (actor)
Smashing Nine Dragon Mountain  (actor)
Burning of Nine Dragon Mountain (actor)

1933:
The Way Out (aka Shining Path)  (director)

1934:
Good Bye! Shanghai                     (director, writer) 

Gu Wuwei (1892-1961)

    Gu Wuwei 顾无为 was born in Shaoxing, Zhejiang in 1892, and grew up in Nanjing.  He initially trained for a law enforcement career, and after attending the Shanghai Police Academy, graduated from the Southern Law School.  But he became increasingly involved in political activities, and after joining the Tongmenghui, the amalgam of revolutionary groups supporting Sun Yat-sen, he turned to writing revolutionary plays, and abandoned his original career path to do publicity and liaison work for Sun.  With the founding of the Republic, he established a theater in Changsha, Hunan.  In 1915 he moved to Shanghai and continued his political work, and at one point was arrested for his open opposition to Yuan Shikai's attempt to install himself as a new emperor.  Artistically, Gu Wuwei concentrated on writing operas, performing in most of them.  In 1925 he founded the Da Zhongguo (Great China) film studio, and took on the role of principal director.  He directed, wrote and acted in several films throughout the 1920s, both for his own studio and then for the Great Wall studio.  He then took on the position of CEO of the Dahua Film Company, and also operated motion picture and stage theaters in Shanghai and Nanjing.  When the PRC was founded in 1949, Gu Wuwei relocated to Hong Kong, where he died in 1961.
********************** 
Filmography (as director, unless noted otherwise):

1925:
Who is the Mother?                  (also actor)

1926: 
Hell and Heaven                      (also actor)
The Milky Way Lovers               (writer)
Princess Lotus, I-III                   (writer)

1927:
Conquering the Dragon King
General Xue Conquers the West I,II
Three Kingdoms:  Cao Cao had the Emperor in his Power (actor)
Three Kingdoms:  Fengyi Pavilion
Bloodshed at Mandarin Duck Mansion                               (actor)

1928: 
Rescuing Mother from the Mountain
Hong Hai'er 

Wang Jiting (1901 - 194?): On and Offscreen Playboy

   Wang Jiting 王吉亭 came from a wealthy family in Shanghai, where his father owned a store dealing in foreign goods which was very popular with Shanghai's sizable and affluent foreign expatriate community. The son was educated in one of the city's better English schools, and grew up a very prominent figure in local society, well known among both Chinese and foreigners, and never lacking for friends.  What was once called a "wealthy young man about town," he drove a car, rode horseback, loved to gamble and frequent Shanghai's better-class brothels.

    By the early 1920s, Wang Jiting had acquired a strong interest in movies.  He approached the Mingxing company's Zheng Zhegu, who he knew socially, and expressed the desire to get into this new, emerging industry.  Zheng got him a part in the studio's next production,《Lured Into Marriage》, cast in the role of a worker.  Zheng and director Zhang Shichuan were both impressed with Wang Jiting's silent acting facial expressions, and agreed that with training, the newcomer could become a good actor.  They cast him again, this time in《The Good Brothers》(1925), and his performance led Zhang Shichuan to offer him a contract which included a training spot in the studio's acting school as well as film appearances.

    The studio made considerable use of him in 1925, casting him first in《The Last Conscience》as playboy Tian Dexiu, who runs off with the miserly main character's mistress and a large amount of his money.  This was the first film in which he was cast opposite Xuan Jinglin, the next being《A Shanghai Woman》, in which she was a high-class courtesan who marries a wealthy playboy (Wang) who later abandons her.  Although newcomers, both quickly showed talent for playing denizens of Shanghai's nightlife, perhaps stemming from their personal backgrounds.  As someone who had spent much of his youth as a high-living womanizer, Wang Jiting's portrayals of playboys and libertines were right on target, while Xuan Jinglin was herself a former brothel inmate.

    In《A Pitiful Girl》(1925), opposite Zhang Zhiyun and with Xuan Jinglin in a major supporting role, Wang Jiting played a pimp who specializes in trapping innocent girls into prostitution.  His portrayal of the rogue was praised for how convincing it was, again perhaps due to his firsthand understanding of the brothel milieu and those who frequented it.  In any case, critics called his portrayal both vivid and realistic, and it is considered his representative work.

[right, Wang Jiting in a 1920s movie newspaper advertisement]    

    After again playing the chief villain in《The New Person's Family》(1926) opposite Zhang Zhiyun, and with top stars Wang Yuanlong and Yang Naimei (themselves no strangers to Shanghai's nightlife) sharing top billing, Wang Jiting's reputation as an A-list movie bad guy had grown to where he was considered on a par with the Mingxing studio's top villain, Wang Xianzhai, so much so that other studios pursued his services, if not as a contract player, then as guest artist.  Mingxing usually turned down such guest requests, but when Mingxing director and co-founder Ren Jinping  任矜苹 founded his own studio, Zhang Shichuan agreed to loan out Wang Jiting to make《Three Shanghai Women》for Ren, Zhang's close personal friend despite his now being a business competitor.  But with this one exception, Wang Jiting (like fellow villain Wang Xianzhai) was steadfast in his loyalty to the studio which had given him his start in movies, portraying nasties for Mingxing from 1924 right up until the Japanese occupation of Shanghai in 1937 forced the studio to shut down.

    Wang Jiting was also an important part of Mingxing's blockbuster martial arts success, the 1928-30 series《Burning of Red Lotus Temple》, in which he played one of the principal evildoers while also serving as assistant director.

    But with the coming of sound, Wang's popularity began to decline.  He spoke Mandarin, but not well, so while his film credits for the 1930s included some of the highlights of what is considered China's "Golden Age" of filmmaking, he increasingly found himself limited to smaller roles with fewer spoken lines.  Another detriment to his career was that his old, dissolute habits of late hours, carousing and opium smoking were beginning to catch up with him physically, and steadily declining health led to his leaving movies in 1939.  He returned briefly after World War II, but after making a few uncredited appearances in insignificant pictures, he disappeared from the scene for good.  Wang Jiting died in Shanghai in the late 1940s, exact date unrecorded.
************* 
Filmography (all as actor, unless noted):

1924:
Lured Into Marriage (aka Love and Vanity)

1925:
The Last Conscience
Young Master Feng
The Good Brothers
A Blind Orphan Girl
A Pitiful Girl
A Shanghai Woman

1926:
Lovelorn Actress
The Rich Man's Daughter
Her Sorrows
Lonely Orchid (pts.1,2)
Three Shanghai Women
April Roses
Nameless Hero

1927:

Xuan Zang Disputes the Doctrine

Fallen Plum Blossom (pts.1-3)

Ma Yongzhen of Shandong

Sacrifice for Parents

Real and False Daughters

1928:

White Cloud Pagoda (pts.1,2)

Luoyang Bridge

A Revengeful Man

Heroine in Black

Burning of the Red Lotus Temple (pts.1-3)  [also Asst.Director]

The Girl Detective

The Swordswoman Rescues the Lady

1929: 

Blood of the Lovers

Papa Loves Mama

Confessing her Sins

Burning of the Red Lotus Temple (pts.4-8) [also Asst.Director]

Little Hero Liu Jin

New Journey to the West (pt.1)

Tears and Flowers (pts.1-2)

1930:

Burning of the Red Lotus Temple (pts.9-16) [also Asst.Director] 

New Journey to the West (pts.2-3) 

Three Fathers

A Brave Man Saves a Beauty [Co-Director]

1931:

Songstress Red Peony

Lone Duck at Sunset

A Shanghai Girl

Joining the Army for His Wife [Co-Director]

1932:

Such Heaven

Love and Life [Co-Director]

1933:

Cries of Women

Little Sister's Tragedy [Co-Director]

1934:

A Brief Life

1935:

The Boatman's Daughter

Jade Horse

1936:

Flowers of Spring

Red Crabapple

Diamonds

New and Old Shanghai

1937:

Street Angels

Four Daughters

New Year's Money

1938:

A Cheated Girl 

Chen Tian (? - ?)

   Chen Tian (陈天) was a prolfiic director of minor films in the 1920s.  But his career was disrupted for a time by the coming of sound, which had a negative effect on the careers of most of the film industry's Cantonese speakers, and later by the Pacific war.  Although he was primarily a director, his problems with the Mandarin dialect hindered his working with the new breed of Mandarin speakers who became dominant in the sound era.  Chen was a native of Chaoyang, Guangdong province, and in his early years was a stage actor in his home province, and in 1925 started his own studio there, making two short films.  He went to Shanghai in 1926, where he established an acting school, with a movie studio where his students could gain experience.  After directing two films for his studio/school, he shut down the business and returned to Guangdong.  But in 1927 he returned to Shanghai and began free-lancing as a director for minor studios there.  He made his last silent film in 1933, after which he returned to Guangdong and entered private business.  In 1937, Chen moved to Hong Kong and began making Cantonese films.
************
Filmography (all as director, unless noted otherwise):

1925:
True Love (also writer)
Sword and Zither (also writer)
1926:
Internecine Feud
Lottery Ticket
A Legendary Luminous Pearl
1927:
The White Hibiscus, I, II
Love Slave
Reunion
1928:
The Trap
A Traveler's Tale
The Flying Man
The Tiger and a Maid
1929:
Romantic Heroine
The Bitterness of a Marriage (also actor)
1933:
Young Soldiers
1937:
The Tender Heart  (actor)
The Magnificent Country
Lady, Be Mine
1938:
Woman Spies
1951:
A Pretty Girl's Favours  

Ye Yisheng (? - ?)

    Ye Yisheng 叶一声 was a director of action films for a succession of second-tier studios in the early 1930s.  He began his directing career with the Hujiang Movie Co. in 1930, directing《Kunlun Mountain Thief》.  After this he moved to the Jinan Film Company, where he served as director of such films as《Golden Island Devil》. Ironically, despite devoting most of his career to directing, his representative work is considered to be《Burning of Seven Star Mansion》(1930), in which he acted a major role but did not direct.
_________________________
Filmography (director, except as indicated):

 

 

1929:
Kunlun Mountain Thief
1930:
Love in Hard Times
Golden Island Devil
The Adventurer
Monks with Justice
Burning of Seven-Star Mansion, pt.I,II (actor)
1931:
Burning of Seven-Star Mansion, pts.III-VI  (actor)
The Temple Rogue
1933:
Sins in Ailating City (co-director with Qian Xuefeng 钱雪凡)
1941:
Female Pirates

Chen Qiufeng (? - ?)

     Native of Yixing, Jiangsu.  After secondary school, Chen joined the New Drama Group as an actor, and traveled with the company performing in various places around East China.  In 1924, he moved to Shanghai and joined the New Dramatic Troupe headed by Gu Wuwei (顾无为), usually playing earnest and likable young men, and was well-received by audiences.  In 1925, he assisted Gu Wuwei in starting the Da Zhongguo (Great China) Film Company, for which he assumed concurrent roles as director and actor.  In 1920s film roles he was noted for portraying famous characters from classical Chinese literature, such as the Buddhist monk Xuanzang in the "Journey to the West" series.  All his film directing efforts were in 1927-28, but his acting career extended into the mid-30s.  Chen then returned to the stage, and in the 1940s served as artistic director of Shanghai's Hua Yue Dramatic Troupe.

Filmography (as actor unless otherwise noted): 

1925:
Who's His Mother?
1926:
Hell and Heaven
Elopement
Midnight Lovers
Frustrated Hero
Meng Jiangnü
1927:
Story of Han Xiangzi
Rebuild the Republic
Three Kingdoms:  Diao Chan Saves the Nation
Journey to the West:  Uproar in Heaven  (also director)
1928:
Monkey King Conquers the Black Wind  (also director)
Journey to the West:  the Bottomless Pit  (co-director)
Journey to the West:  the Yellow Monster  (co-director)
Journey to the West:  the Kingdom of the Black Rooster  (director)
The Goddess Jin Jing [aka An Evil Woman Bars the Way]  (co-director)
The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom
New Shaolin Temple:  Fang Shiyu [Fang Sai-Yuk] Accepts a Challenge  (writer)
1931:
Blue Skies After the Rain
1934:
Renzhu [aka Lonely Orchid]
1936:
By the Huangpu River

Wu Wenchao (1907 - ?)

    Actor/director.  Born September 27, 1904 in Shaoxing, Zhejiang.  After graduating from high school in Shanghai, he enrolled in the Mingxing studio film school as an actor, then made his initial screen appearance in 1923's "An Orphan Rescues his Grandfather" in an uncredited bit part.  In the same year he moved over to Dan Duyu's Shanghai Shadow Play Company, appearing in several small roles, again uncredited.  His first credited role, an important one, came in the Shanghai studio's "Cave of the Silken Web," (1927) in which he became the first actor to portray on-screen one of Chinese literature's most beloved characters, The Monkey King.  After that, he worked for a variety of small studios, mostly in secondary villian roles.  In 1929, Wu turned to directing, and after gaining some experience started his own studio in 1937, the Lucky Star Film Company, making five movies in which he acted as well as directed.  Lucky Star folded when the Japanese occupied Shanghai, but Wu continued working for other studios which remained in operation during the war.  In 1950 he moved to Hong Kong and continued his career there, directing over 20  films, the last in 1974. 

Wen Yimin (1890 - 1978)

    Wen Yimin (文逸民) was of Manchu ethnicity, born in Beijing.  He joined the Youlian Film Company in Shanghai in 1925, and became the studio's top director in 1927 when he directed "Heroic Son and Daughter," in which he also co-starred with his  future wife, Fan Xuepeng.  The movie had four sequels, and was one of the major successes of the early swordsman genre that became a mania in China at the end of the 1920s.  In 1934, he and Fan moved to the Tianyi studio, where he directed her in such successes as "Shattered Dream in the Dance Hall" and "Mother."  The couple later split up, and in 1939 he moved to Yihua and in 1943 to Zhonghua, two of Shanghai's wartime studios.  At both of these he continued to both act and direct.  In 1947 he left the Chinese mainland and worked for several studios in Hong Kong.  Wen directed his last film in 1959, but continued acting work in Hong Kong and Taiwan into the early 1970s.  Wen Yimin died in Hong Kong on December 22, 1978.  In a career that spanned five decades, he amassed over 100 credits as a director and actor.

Chen Kengran (1905-1958): Early Action Film Director

    Chen Kengran (陈铿然) was a native of Chaozhou, Guangdong, and was educated at the Shanghai Youth Association, where he became involved with its theater group as a playwright, then an actor.  In 1925, with startup money borrowed from his father, Chen established the Youlian Film Company, with himself as writer/director in addition to being studio head.  When the May 30th student demonstrations erupted, he dispatched his film crew to record it, later releasing the film as one of China's earliest documentaries.  By 1931 Youlian had produced over 40 feature films, including its most successful effort, "Huangjiang Nüxia," a 13-part series of swordswoman films directed by Chen and starring his actress wife Xu Qinfang in the title role.  In 1936, he joined the Mingxing studio as a director.  During World War II Chen worked for the China Film Company in the wartime capital of Chongqing in a non-filmmaking role, then resumed directing after the war, until failing health forced his retirement in 1954.  He died in 1958.

Zhu Shouju (? - ?)

    First generation screenwriter and director Zhu Shouju 朱瘦菊 had established a solid literary reputation before turning to film, authoring three best-selling novels under his pen name, "The Ocean Dreamweaver".  In 1920 he worked with artist-turned-filmmaker Dan Duyu and veteran stage director/actor Guan Haifeng to found the Shanghai Film Company. then the Baihe studio.  In 1924, Zhu became editor-in-chief of "Movie Magazine" (电影杂志), as well as writing the script for two films that year, "The Abandoned Wife" and "Tea-picking Girl".   He made his directing debut for Baihe in 1925 with "Old Love",  and in that same year negotiated the merger with Da Zhonghua, becoming the head of the resulting new studio.  In his film career, Zhu wrote and/or directed 24 feature films, the last in 1948.