Gong Li on her witch character in Mulan, why Saturday Fiction is an important film, and her favourite roles

Gong Li is considering the favourite roles of her long and distinguished career. “Personally speaking from all the roles I played all these years, I should say there are three movies that are most important to me,” the Chinese mega-star says.

The first is Zhang Yimou’s The Story of Qiu Ju, his 1992 tale of “a countryside woman” that won her the Venice Film Festival’s Volpi Cup for best actress and saw the film collect the prestigious festival’s Golden Lion for best movie. The second is her most recent Zhang movie, the eighth of her career with the man she once dated, 2014’s  Coming Home , set in China during the Cultural Revolution.

“The first movie [The Story of Qiu Ju] marked a great improvement in my career. And this one, Coming Home, is a different drama, a different film,” she explains. The tale – which has received moderate reviews – in which her character develops amnesia after the return of her husband from a labour camp, may seem a curious choice compared to their earlier touchstones like Raise the Red Lantern and Ju Dou.

More surprisingly, Gong’s third choice is Saturday Fiction , the Lou Ye film that had its premiere in Venice last year. “I believe Saturday Fiction is a very rare type of film in today’s cinema,” she says earnestly. It is an espionage tale set in Japanese-occupied Shanghai in 1941 – in which she plays an actress who has mastered the art of deception. “I think this film will be able to help everyone to remember that China has suffered a great disaster during World War II,” the actress says.

It arrives as part of a triple-pronged comeback for the 54 year-old, her first films since 2016’s The Monkey King 2 . “I’m not a very productive actor,” she admits. “I don’t think productivity means anything to me. I’m always looking for the character that I really want to play. If there’s no such character, I can wait.”