Edward Yang

Edward Yang (; November 6, 1947 – June 29, 2007) was a Taiwanese filmmaker. Yang, along with fellow auteurs Hou Hsiao-hsien and Tsai Ming-liang, was one of the leading film-makers of the Taiwanese New Wave and Taiwanese cinema. He won the Best Director Award at Cannes for his 2000 film '' Yi Yi''.

Youth and early career

Yang was born in Shanghai in 1947, and grew up in Taipei, Taiwan. After studying Electrical Engineering in National Chiao Tung University (located in Hsinchu, Taiwan), where he received his bachelor's degree ( BSEE), he enrolled in the graduate program at the University of Florida, where he received his master's degree in electrical engineering in 1974.''International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers''. Eds. Sara Pendergast and Tom Pendergast. Vol. 2: Directors. 4th ed. Detroit: St. James Press, 2001. p1092-1094. 4 vols. "Edward Yang" accessed through Thomson Gale's Biography Research Centre 1 July 2007 During this time and briefly afterwards, Yang worked at the Center for Informatics Research at the University of Florida. Yang always had a great interest in film ever since he was a child, but put away his aspirations in order to pursue a career in the high-tech industry.

A brief enrollment at USC Film School after graduating with his M.S.E.E. convinced Yang that the world of film was not for him – he thought USC film school's teaching methodologies were too commercial and mainstream oriented.Shelly Kraicer and Lisa Roosen-Runge, Edward Yang: A Taiwanese Independent Filmmaker in Conversation

Associated Press, Edward Yang, 59, Director who focused on Taiwan Life, http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_6280205, July 2, 2007. Yang then applied and was accepted into Harvard's architecture school, the Harvard Graduate School of Design, but decided not to attend. Thereafter, he went to Seattle to work in microcomputers and defense software.

While working in Seattle, Yang came across the Werner Herzog film ''Aguirre, the Wrath of God'' (1972): this encounter rekindled Yang's passion for film and introduced him to a wide range of classics in world and European cinema. Yang was particularly inspired by the films of Italian director Michelangelo Antonioni (Antonioni's influence has shown up in some of Yang's later works). He married Taiwanese pop-singer and music legend Tsai Chin in May 1985. They divorced in August 1995, and he subsequently married pianist Kai-Li Peng ().

Later career

Early works

Yang returned to Taiwan in 1980, where his former USC friend Wei-Cheng Yu asked him to write the script for and serve as a production aide on his film, ''The Winter of 1905'' (1981), in which he also had a small acting role. The film went on to be nominated for a Best Cinematography award at the 1982 Golden Horse Film Festival and Awards. His script brought him to the attention of Sylvia Chang, who hired him to write and direct an episode of the television miniseries she was producing, ''Eleven Women''. Yang's two-and-a-half hour episode, "Duckweed" (also known as "Floating Weeds"), concerned the story of a country girl who moves to Taipei with dreams of entering the entertainment industry, and was his first directorial effort.

The following year, Yang was asked to direct and write a short for the seminal Taiwanese New Wave omnibus film '' In Our Time'' (1982), which featured other short films from fresh young directors such as Yi Chang, Ko I-Chen, and Tao Te-chen. Yang's contribution, "Desires" (also known as "Expectation"), is about a young girl's experiences going through puberty.

''That Day, on the Beach''

Yang then followed that short with several of his major works. While his contemporary Hou Hsiao-hsien focused more on the countryside, Yang was a poet of the city, analyzing the environment and relationships of urban Taiwan in nearly all his films. Yang's first feature film, '' That Day, on the Beach'' (1983), was a fractured modernist narrative reflecting on couples and families that spliced timelines. The film is also notable as being one of the first films – and perhaps first feature film – that Christopher Doyle received a Director of Photography credit for before going on to become Wong Kar Wai's frequent collaborator and cinematographer, along with DP Hui Kung Chang, who went on to provide the cinematography for many of Yang's later films. The film also won a Best Cinematography award from the 1983 Asia-Pacific Film Festival, and was nominated for three awards at the 1983 Golden Horse Film Festival and Awards: Best Feature Film, Best Director (Yang), and Best Original Screenplay (Wu Nien-jen and Edward Yang). Screenwriter Wu Nien-jen would later collaborate with Yang as an actor, in '' Taipei Story'' (1985) (as the Taxi Driver), '' Mahjong'' (1996) (as a Gangster in Black Suit) and as the star "N.J." in '' Yi Yi'' (2000). For the film, Yang was also nominated for the Golden Montgolfiere award at the 1983 Nantes Three Continents Festival