Chow Yun Fat Biography
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Chow Yun Fat
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- This is a Chinese name; the family name is Chow.
| Chow Yun-Fat SBS | ||||||||||
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| Chinese name | 周潤發 (Traditional) | |||||||||
| Chinese name | 周润发 (Simplified) | |||||||||
| Pinyin | Zhōu Rùnfā (Mandarin) | |||||||||
| Jyutping | Jau1 Yeon6faat3 (Cantonese) | |||||||||
| Born | May 18, 1955 Hong Kong |
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| Years active | 1974 - present | |||||||||
| Spouse(s) | Candise Yu (1983-1983) Jasmine Chan (1986-) |
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Chow Yun-Fat SBS (traditional Chinese: 周潤發; simplified Chinese: 周润发; pinyin: Zhōu Rùnfā; Cantonese Yale: Jàu Yeuhn Faat; born May 18, 1955) is a Hong Kong Film Awards winning actor. Best known in Asia for his collaboration with filmmaker John Woo in heroic bloodshed genre films A Better Tomorrow, The Killer, and Hard-Boiled; and to the West for his role as King Rama IV in Anna and the King. He mainly plays in dramatic films and has won three Hong Kong Film Awards for "Best Actor" and two Golden Horse Awards for "Best Actor" in Taiwan.
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Biography
Early life
Chow was born in Hong Kong, to a mother who was a cleaning lady and vegetable farmer, and a father who worked at a Shell Oil Company tanker.12 Of Hakka origins 3 4, he grew up in a farming community on Lamma Island in a house with no electricity.5 He woke up at dawn each morning to help his mother sell herbal jelly and Hakka tea-pudding on the streets and in the afternoons he went to work in the fields. His family moved to Kowloon when he was ten. At seventeen, he quit school to help support the family by doing odd jobs - bellboy, postman, camera salesman, taxi driver. His life started to change when he responded to a newspaper advertisement and his actor-trainee application was accepted by TVB, the local television station. He signed a three-year contract with the studio and made his acting debut. With his striking good looks and easy-going style, Chow became a heartthrob and a familiar face in soap operas that were exported internationally.
Career
It did not take long for Chow to become a household name in Hong Kong following his role in the hit series The Bund in 1980. The Bund, about the rise and fall of a gangster in 1930s Shanghai, made him a star. It was one of the most popular TV series ever made in Hong Kong and was a hit throughout Asia.
Although Chow continued his TV success, his goal was to become a big screen actor. His occasional ventures onto the big screens with low-budget films, however, were disastrous. Success finally came when he teamed up with director John Woo in the 1986 gangster action-melodrama A Better Tomorrow, which swept the box offices in Asia and established Chow and Woo as megastars. A Better Tomorrow won him his first Best Actor award at the Hong Kong Film Awards. It was the highest grossing film in Hong Kong history at the time, and it set the standard for Hong Kong gangster films to come. Taking the opportunity, Chow quit TV entirely. With his new image from A Better Tomorrow, he made many more 'gun fu' or 'heroic bloodshed' films, such as A Better Tomorrow 2 (1987), Prison on Fire, Prison on Fire II, The Killer (1989), A Better Tomorrow 3 (1990) and Hard Boiled (1992).
Chow may be best known for playing honorable tough guys, whether cops or criminals, but he also starred in comedies like Diary of a Big Man (1988) and Now You See Love, Now You Don't (1992) and romantic blockbusters such as Love in a Fallen City (1984) and An Autumn's Tale (1987), for which he was named best actor at the Golden Horse Awards. He brought together his disparate personae in the 1989 film God of Gamblers (Du Shen), directed by the prolific Wong Jing, in which he was by turns suave charmer, broad comedian and action hero. The film surprised many, became immensely popular, broke Hong Kong's all-time box office record, and spawned a series of gambling films, as well as several comic sequels starring Andy Lau and Stephen Chow.
The Los Angeles Times proclaimed Chow Yun-Fat "the coolest actor in the world." At this point, he had not made a single American film. Being as one of the hottest screen commodities in Hong Kong, Chow moved to Hollywood in the mid '90s in an attempt to duplicate his success in Asia. His first two films, The Replacement Killers (1998) and The Corruptor (1999), were box office disappointments. His next film Anna and the King (1999) did better, but it did not give Chow the boost he needed to be a notable star in America. He returned to Asia for the (2000) film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and it became a winner at both the international box office and the Oscars. In 2003, Chow came back to Hollywood and starred in Bulletproof Monk. In 2004, he made a surprise cameo in the mainland Chinese indie-hit Waiting Alone. In 2006, he teamed up with Gong Li in the film, Curse of the Golden Flower, directed by Zhang Yimou.
In 2007, Chow was cast as the pirate captain Sao Feng in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. His character, however, was omitted when the movie was shown in mainland China. His character was criticized as demeaning as it "vilifies and humiliates the Chinese."6 Prior to the 2008 Summer Olympics, the PRC administration announced that "wronged spirits and violent ghosts, monsters, demons, and other inhuman portrayals" were banned from audio visual content.7 Despite the censorship, the unedited version of the movie was freely sold on the black market without government intervention because viewers wanted to see Chow Yun Fat, whose star status went beyond typecasting.
Chow had often wished to be regarded as a serious dramatic actor in Hollywood. Unfortunately, he often landed in roles that stereotyped him as an Asian action hero. His versatile acting abilities, proven in many Hong Kong films, are yet to be seen in the United States.
In the upcoming movie Dragonball, scheduled for release in April 2009, Chow Yun-Fat will play Master Roshi.8
Book
On June 26, 2008, Chow released his first photo collection in Hong Kong, which includes pictures taken on the sets of his films. Proceeds from sales of the book were donated to Sichuan earthquake victims. Published by Louis Vuitton, the books were sold in Vuitton's Hong Kong and Paris stores.910
Personal life
Chow was married twice; first to Candice Yu (Chinese: 余安安; pinyin: Yú Ānan) in 1983, who was an actress from Asia Television Ltd, TVB's rival. The marriage lasted nine months. Chow later married Singaporean Jasmine Tan (simplified Chinese: 陈萫莲; traditional Chinese: 陳薈蓮; pinyin: Chén huilián) in 1986. Currently, they have no children, although Chow has a goddaughter, Celine Ng, former child model for Chickeeduck and other various companies.
Filmography
For more information, see Chow Yun-Fat filmography.
Chow has appeared in over 80 films and 24 television series.
Video games
- Stranglehold (video game)
- Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (video game)
- Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (video game)
References
- ^ Yun-Fat Chow Biography (1955-)
- ^ http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_product=KC&p_theme=kc&p_action=search&p_maxdocs=200&p_topdoc=1&p_text_direct-0=0EAF46E2D345CD11&p_field_direct-0=document_id&p_perpage=10&p_sort=YMD_date:D&s_trackval=GooglePM
- ^ "Honorary Doctor of Letters - Mr CHOW Yun-fat" (PDF).
- ^ "Martial parts - Artist: Yun-Fat, Chow".
- ^ Film chat: Chow Yun-Fat - CHOWING THE FAT; HOW EASTERN HERO CHOW YUN-FAT CAME TO HOLD THE WEST HOSTAGE. BY ANNA DAY.(Features) | Article from The Mirror (London, England) | Hi...
- ^ "China censors takes scissors to latest 'Pirates of the Caribbean' film". Agence France-Presse (2007-06-15). Retrieved on 2007-06-17.
- ^ "Regulators now spooked by ghost stories". Reuters (2002-08-14). Retrieved on 2008-02-18.
- ^ Thewest.com.au
- ^ gmanews.tv, 'Crouching Tiger' actor launches book for benefit of Chinese earthquake victims
- ^ pr-inside.com, 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' star Chow Yun-fat publishes photo collection
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Chow Yun Fat |
| Awards and achievements | ||
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| Preceded by Danny Lee for Law With Two Phases |
Golden Horse Awards for Best Actor 1985 for Hong Kong 1941 |
Succeeded by Ti Lung for A Better Tomorrow |
| Preceded by Kent Cheng for Why Me? |
Hong Kong Film Awards for Best Actor 1987 for A Better Tomorrow |
Succeeded by Chow Yun-Fat for City on Fire |
| Preceded by Ti Lung for A Better Tomorrow |
Golden Horse Awards for Best Actor 1987 for An Autumn's Tale |
Succeeded by Alex Man for Dua Tau A |
| Preceded by Chow Yun-Fat for A Better Tomorrow |
Hong Kong Film Awards for Best Actor 1988 for City on Fire |
Succeeded by Sammo Hung for Painted Faces |
| Preceded by Sammo Hung for Painted Faces |
Hong Kong Film Awards for Best Actor 1990 for All About Ah Long |
Succeeded by Leslie Cheung for Days of Being Wild |
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