Yuen Ling-yuk (1992)

Director:

Stanley Kwan

Writer:

Tai An-Ping Chiu (writer)

Release Date:

20 February 1992 (Hong Kong)

Genre:

Biography | Drama | Romance

Plot:

Biopic of 1930's Chinese actress Ruan Ling Yu. |

Awards:

7 wins & 5 nominations

Cast

Maggie Cheung	...	Ruan Ling-yu and Herself
Han Chin	...	Tang Chi-Shan
Tony Leung Ka Fai	...	Tsai Chu-sheng / Himself
Carina Lau	...	Lily Li / Herself
Waise Lee	...	Li Min-wei
Li-li Li	...	Herself (as Lily Li)
Lawrence Ng	...	Chang Ta-Min
Cecilia Yip	...	Lin Chu-Chu
Kelvin Wong	...	Nier Erh
San Yip	...	Ms Liu
Paul Chang	...	Boss of Lianhua
Yanyan Chen	...	Herself - Interview
Lingyu Ruan	...	Herself (archive footage)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Stanley Kwan	...	Himself

Also Known As:

Center Stage (Hong Kong: English title)
Centre Stage (Australia)
Ruan Lingyu (Hong Kong: Mandarin title)
The Actress
The New China Woman

Runtime:

Australia:126 min | Hong Kong:147 min (director's cut) | Hong Kong:118 min (edited version) | Hong Kong:154 min (restored DVD version)

Country:

Hong Kong

Language:

Cantonese | Mandarin

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

South Korea:18 | France:U

Filming Locations:

China

Company:

Golden Way Films Ltd.

Trivia:

With her win for Best Actress at the 1993 Berlin Film Festival, Maggie Cheung became the first Chinese actor to win a major European film award.

Movie Connections:

References Tao hua qi xue ji (1931)

Baby steps for Maggie Cheung/an innovative vision of the cinema for Stanley Kwan

The experience of watching this film in 2006 has been similar to watching Marilyn Monroe in "Don't Bother to Knock" after having seen her later, greater performances. Maggie Cheung's (Garbo-like) capability to release interior emotion that will later haunt viewers in "In the Mood for Love" is beginning to take root in "Yuen Ling-yuk." Later on, Wong Kar Wai was able to use editing to sculpt her performance into consistent, unrelenting intensity. Here she is just beginning to explore the boundaries of her talent. This fits in with director Stanley Kwan's need to create a work in progress, like the productions we watch as they are filmed. He both exploits and denounces the artificial milieu as the actors slip in and out of their roles and the film steps in and out of period. The trial-and-error method of Yuen Ling-yuk is matched by Kwan's letting Cheung find her way through the moods of the character, as if she were trying on a different mask for each moment of the life she is embodying. By 2000 the integration of facial and corporal expressions into dramatic expression would be seamless.

It would be interesting to know which directors saw this film when it was shown on the festival circuit. Did Tim Burton know that he had a Chinese counterpart who also let his affection for a forgotten era in cinema guide the pace (disconcerting for many) of his tribute when he made "Ed Wood" a year later? In 1999 when Benoît Jacquot filmed "La Tosca," did he think of this film for his distancing technique that juxtaposed real singers at a recording session filmed in black-and-white with their operatic characters in colorful period costumes? Perhaps even Scorsese took inspiration for "Aviator" from the 1930s shadowy wood-paneling/glossy brilliantine look that comes much more easily to Kwan.

This film can be placed alongside "Sylvia Scarlett" or "The Unbearable Lightness of Being," wherein young actresses were given the freedom to go beyond what they had done before and reach for what they would do, under the guidance of a director whose search to take the viewer into (then) uncharted waters inspired the performers to deepen their potential.