Sheng Zhimin (born 1969) is a Chinese filmmaker from Beijing. Unlike other directors to emerge in recent years, Sheng has had no formal training. He instead began his career as a line producer,

screenwriter A screenplay writer (also called screenwriter, scriptwriter, scribe or scenarist) is a writer who practices the craft of screenwriting, writing screenplays on which mass media, such as films, television programs and video games, are based. ...

, and assistant director for other filmmakers like Jia Zhangke, Fruit Chan and Zhang Yang. In these positions, Sheng worked on the films ''

Spicy Love Soup ''Spicy Love Soup'' () is a 1997 Chinese film directed by Zhang Yang and written by Zhang, Liu Fendou, Cai Shangjun, and Diao Yi'nan based on a story by Zhang and Peter Loehr. ''Spicy Love Soup'' was produced by Loehr's Imar Film Company, Xi'an ...

'', ''

Durian Durian ''Durian Durian'' () is a 2000 Hong Kong film directed by Fruit Chan. The film portrays the experiences of a young girl, Fan ( Mak Wai-Fan), and her sex worker neighbour, Yan (Qin Hailu), in Hong Kong. Plot Yan is a prostitute from the mainland ...

'', '' Public Toilet'', and '' Platform''.

''Bliss''

Sheng's first, and so far only directorial effort was 2006's '' Bliss'', a family drama set in the central Chinese city of

Chongqing Chongqing ( or ; ; Sichuanese dialects, Sichuanese pronunciation: , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ), Postal Romanization, alternately romanized as Chungking (), is a Direct-administered municipalities of China, municipality in Southwes ...

. ''Bliss'' premiered at the 2006 Locarno International Film Festival where it won the

NETPAC The Network for the Promotion of Asian Cinema (NETPAC) is a worldwide organization of 29 member countries. It was created as the result of a conference on Asian cinema organized by Cinemaya, the Asian Film Quarterly, in New Delhi in 1990 at the inst ...

award, and had its North American premiere at the

2006 Toronto International Film Festival The 31st Toronto International Film Festival ran from September 7 to September 16, 2006. Opening the festival was Zacharias Kunuk and Norman Cohn's ''The Journals of Knud Rasmussen'', a film that "explores the history of the through the eyes of a ...

. It also screened at the

2007 Shanghai International Film Festival Sebastian Bieniek (middle), press conference 2007 Shanghai International Film Festival The 2007 Shanghai International Film Festival was the 10th such festival devoted to international cinema to be held in the city of Shanghai in the People's Repub ...

, where it picked up a best picture prize for the New Talent side-competition.

Influences

Sheng lists Martin Scorsese's '' Raging Bull'' and

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 Be ...

's ''

Yi Yi ''Yi Yi'' () is a 2000 Taiwanese drama film written and directed by Edward Yang centering around the struggles of an engineer named NJ (played by Wu Nien-jen) and three generations of his middle-class Taiwanese family in Taipei. The title in C ...

'' as important influences in his directorial style. He also considers Jia Zhangke, Fruit Chan, and Yasujirō Ozu among his favorite filmmakers.

References

External links

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Sheng Zhimin
at Cinemasie Film directors from Beijing Screenwriters from Beijing Living people 1969 births {{China-film-director-stub