Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi’s 5 best performances – from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon to Memoirs of a Geisha and The Grandmaster about Bruce Lee’s teacher Ip Man

Feb 9 , 2021

From left, Zhang Ziyi in the films The Road Home, 2046, The Grandmaster. Photos: Reuters; @moviesmoviesmoremovies, @ilovefilmstillzzzzzz/Instagram

She has acted opposite screen legends such as Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Donnie Yen and Michelle Yeoh

Her body of work ranges from wuxia tales like The House of Flying Daggers to Korean movies and Hollywood epics

Zhang Ziyi is surely the most important Chinese actress of her generation. At times, tabloid gossip has threatened to overshadow her achievements – more than once she has gone to court and won cases regarding false reports about her private life – but she remains one of the country’s best actresses and arguably the first to achieve significant recognition in the West. Other renowned Chinese actresses such as Gong Li and Shu Qi focus more on art house productions, while, despite an enviable resume in Chinese-language cinema, Fan Bingbing has yet to earn more than brief cameos in the likes of Iron Man 3 or X-Men.

Zhang has achieved so much more. She has starred in classics in Hong Kong and China as well as in Hollywood blockbusters. On the occasion of her 42nd birthday, on February 9, we look at five roles that have defined her career.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)

Zhang’s first movie role was in acclaimed director Zhang Yimou’s 2000 film, The Road Home. She was widely praised for her performance but it was her subsequent film that propelled her to fame. That was the international hit Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Although starring established, heavyweight actors like Chow Yun-fat and Michelle Yeoh, and veteran Cheng Pei-pei, Zhang more than held her own as one of the wuxia tale’s main protagonists. Zhang never looks lost on-screen, and her sword fight with Chow in the bamboo forest remains iconic.

Hero (2002)

Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi in Hero, the martial arts epic directed by director Zhang Yimou and also starring Hong Kong movie stars Jet Li, Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Maggie Cheung. Photo: Reuters

Off the back of the success of Crouching Tiger, Zhang earned a ticket to Hollywood the next year, playing opposite kung fu icon Jackie Chan in Rush Hour 2. Although this brought her more international recognition, it was Hero, in 2002, that earned Zhang applause for her acting talent.

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