John Woo

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John Woo 2005 in Cannes

John Woo ( Chinese  吳宇森  /  吴宇森 , Pinyin Wú Yǔsēn , Jyutping Ng 4 Jyu 5 sam 1 ; born May 1, 1946 in Guangzhou ), according to other sources September 23, 1946, is a Chinese film director. Growing up in Hong Kong , he also works as a film producer and is considered one of the most important protagonists of Hong Kong cinema .

life and work

John Woo was born as Wú Yǔsēn in China in 1946. The wealthy family belonged to the Christian faith, his father was a philosopher. In 1951, Woo's family fled communism to Hong Kong. Due to a tuberculosis illness of the father, who could not find a job, the family became impoverished. In the meantime, Woo lived on the street, where he was confronted with violence and crime. Up to the age of 16 he attended school, which was financed by an American family through a local Lutheran church .

Originally, Woo had flirted with becoming a priest, but the seminary turned it down. At the end of the 1960s he came to film, for which, among other things, he went to the cinema with his mother to make films, such as B. The Wizard of Oz . One of his favorite films in his youth was the western comedy Two Bandits by screenwriter William Goldman and director George Roy Hill from 1969. Woo became a production assistant at Cathay Studios in 1969 ( 國泰 電影 公司  /  国泰 电影 公司 , Guótài Diànyǐng Gōngsī , Jyutping Gwok 3 taai 3 Din 6 jing 2 Gung 1 si 1 ) and learned as an assistant director in the production company of the Shaw Brothers ( 邵氏 兄弟 香港 有限公司 , Shào Shì Xiōngdì Xiānggǎng Yǒuxiàn Gōngsī , Jyutping Siu 6 2 Si 6 Hing 1 dai 6 Hoeng 1 gong Jau 5 haan 6 Gung 1 si 1 ) with well-known filmmakers like Chang Cheh ( 張徹  /  张彻 , Zhāng Chè , Jyutping Zoeng 1 Cit 3 ). In 1973, the low-budget production The Young Dragons ( 鐵漢 柔情  /  铁汉 柔情 , Tiěhàn Róuqíng , Jyutping Tit 3 hon 3 Jau 4 cing 4  - “tough guy, tender feelings”) made his debut feature film as a director, with the young Jackie Chan choreographed the fight scenes. According to the Ricky Hui vehicle Money Crazy ( cant.發 錢 寒 / 发 钱 寒Pinyin Fà Qián Hán, Jyutping Faat3 Cin4 Hon4) from 1977, Woo was committed to comedies for a long time until he starred with City Wolf (1986) Leslie Cheung and Chow Yun-Fat presented an award-winning modern day gangster film. In this, an unscrupulous gangster delivers a colleague to the knife who, after serving his prison sentence, embarks on a campaign of revenge. With the sequel City Wolf II - Abrechnung auf Raten (1987), The Killer (1989), Bullet in the Head (1990) or Hard Boiled (1992), he presented other films of the same style in which he stood out for his aesthetic depictions of violence. In his melancholy gangster ballads, he fused western models such as Stanley Kubrick , Jean-Pierre Melville , Sam Peckinpah or Martin Scorsese with the elegance of Chinese sword fighting films .

In the early 1990s, Woo and his family moved to the United States, where he was the first Asian filmmaker to be entrusted with directing a major Hollywood production. He made his US debut in 1993 with the action film Hard Targets , in which Jean-Claude Van Damme slips into the role of an unemployed sailor who tracks down a clique of millionaires who are hunted down the homeless. Woo dislikes the control in Hollywood that affects the script, casting, or editing, but did not return to Hong Kong due to the large budget. “In Hong Kong we had to make our films with very little money. We were like a fish without water that somehow has to survive. Once you've learned that, you can make expensive Hollywood films too. I never go over my budget, because if you do that too often, you won't get a job at some point, ” said Woo in an interview with Stern in 2000 . During his time in Hong Kong, the filmmaker also worked as a producer, screenwriter, film editor and actor in his films.

With further action films such as Operation: Broken Arrow (1996) or In the Body of the Enemy (1997) Woo managed to build on previous successes. In the latter film, John Travolta and Nicolas Cage competed as FBI employees and international terrorist, which brought Woo the Saturn Award for best director. His most commercially successful film to date was Mission: Impossible II (2000) with Tom Cruise , which grossed US $ 215 million at the box office. Here, according to the opinion of the film service , Woo proved "once again that he is currently the most innovative and interesting action director" . The following war film Windtalkers (2002), again with Nicolas Cage in the lead role, as well as the science fiction thriller Paycheck (2003) with Ben Affleck and Uma Thurman did not match the great success of Mission: Impossible II .

Woo is married and lives in Los Angeles . He is the father of three children. At the 67th Venice Film Festival 2010, Woo received the Golden Lion for life's work. In its statement, the jury highlighted, among other things, the bitter violence that appears in his war and gangster films, the original poetic and romantic influence, and the very personal and energetic figurative tension, which is similar to a "surreal hallucination" .

Filmography (selection)

Director

  • 1973: Fists of the Double K - Hong Kong Face-Off
  • 1974: Belles of Taekwondo (Nu zi tai quan qun ying hui)
  • 1975: Princess Chang Ping ( Dinü hua , as Yusen Wu)
  • 1976: Hand of Death (Shao Lin men)
  • 1977: Money Crazy (Fa qian han)
  • 1977: Follow the Star (Da sha xing yu xiao mei tou)
  • 1978: Last Hurray for Chivalry (Hao xia)
  • 1979: Hello, Late Homecomers (Ha luo, ye gui ren)
  • 1980: From Riches to Rags (Qian zuo guai)
  • 1981: Laughing Times (Hua ji shi dai)
  • 1982: To Hell with the Devil (Mo deng tian shi)
  • 1982: Plain Jane to the Rescue (Ba cai Lin Ya Zhen)
  • 1983: Heroes Shed No Tears (Ying xiong wei lei) (Blast Heroes) (was only released in 1986)
  • 1984: The Time you need a Friend (Xiao jiang)
  • 1985: Run Tiger Run (Liang zhi lao hu)
  • 1986: A Better Tomorrow (Ying huang boon sik) (City Wolf)
  • 1987: A Better Tomorrow 2 (Yinghung bunsik II) (City Wolf II - payment in installments)
  • 1989: The Killer (The xue shuang xiong)
  • 1989: Just Heroes (Hard Boiled II)
  • 1990: Bullet in the Head (Die xue jie tou)
  • 1991: Killer Target (Once a Thief)
  • 1992: Hard Boiled (Lashou shentan)
  • 1993 Hard Target (Hard Target)
  • 1996: Operation: Broken Arrow (Broken Arrow)
  • 1996: Once a Thief: Brother Against Brother (TV movie)
  • 1997: In the body of the enemy (Face / Off)
  • 1998: Blackjack (TV movie)
  • 2000: Mission: Impossible II
  • 2002: Windtalkers
  • 2003: Paycheck - the settlement (Paycheck)
  • 2004: The Robinsons: Lost in Space
  • 2005: All the children in the world
  • 2007: Stranglehold (video game with Chow Yun-Fat as a 3D character)
  • 2008: Red Cliff 1 (Chi bi)
  • 2009: Red Cliff 2 (Chi bi xia: Jue zhan tian xia)
  • 2014: The Crossing
  • 2015: The Crossing 2
  • 2017: Manhunt

actor

  • This filmography is incomplete. Woo made short appearances or extras in numerous films from the 1960s to 1990s that are not included here. A comprehensive overview of the genesis of the film as well as a detailed review can be found in: Thomas Gaschler, Ralph Umard: Woo. Belleville, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-933510-48-1 .
  • 1976: Dragon Forever
  • 1982: Plain Jane to the Rescue
  • 1986: A Better Tomorrow
  • 1988: Roboforce
  • 1990: Bullet in the Head
  • 1991: Killer Target
  • 1991: The Banquet
  • 1992: Twin Dragons - the power duo
  • 1992: Hard Boiled
  • 1997: Task Force
  • 2011: Beginning of the Great Revival (Founding of a Party)

producer

  • 1983: Ghost Bustin '
  • 1995: Never die
  • 1998: The Big Hit
  • 2002: Red Skies
  • 2003: Bulletproof Monk
  • 2004: The Robinsons: Lost in Space
  • 2010: Reign of Assassins
  • 2011: Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale
  • 2011: 7 Brothers

Awards (selection)

  • 1986: Golden Horse Film Festival : Best Director for City Wolf
  • 1987: Hong Kong Film Awards : Best Picture for City Wolf
  • 1990: Hong Kong Film Awards: Best Director for The Killer
  • 1991: Hong Kong Film Awards: Best Editing for Bullet in the Head
  • 1992: Asia-Pacific Film Festival: Best Editing for Hard Boiled
  • 1993: Hong Kong Film Awards: Best Editing for Hard Boiled
  • 1994: Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films, USA: Nominated for Best Director for Hard Target
  • 1997: Sweden Fantastic Film Festival: Grand Jury Prize for In the Body of the Enemy
  • 1998: Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films, USA: Best Director for Im Körper des Feindes
  • 1998: Saturn Award : Best Director for Im Körper des Feindes
  • 1998: Gemini Awards: Nominated Best Series for Once a Thief
  • 2001: Taurus Award 2001 : Action Movie Director Award
  • 2009: Shanghai International Film Festival : Outstanding Contribution to Chinese Cinema
  • 2010: Venice International Film Festival : Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement
  • 2010: Asian Film Award: Top-Grossing Film Director for Chi bi xia: Jue zhan tian xia

literature

  • Michael Bliss: Between the bullets: the spiritual cinema of John Woo . Scarecrow Press, Lanham, Md. 2002, ISBN 978-0-8108-4110-9 .
  • Thomas Gaschler & Ralph Umard: Woo . Verlag Belleville, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-933510-48-1 .
  • Thomas Gaschler & Eckhard Vollmar: Dark Stars . Belleville, Munich 1992, ISBN 3-923646-50-X .
  • Kenneth E Hall: John Woo: the films . McFarland, Jefferson, NC 1999, ISBN 978-0-7864-0619-7 .
  • Karl Matthias Schmidt: Jesus with friends and arms dealers: Religious motifs in the John Woos film. In: Thomas Bohrmann, Werner Veith, Stephan Zöller (Eds.): Handbuch Theologie und Popular Film. Volume 1. Ferdinand Schöningh, Paderborn 2007, ISBN 978-3-506-72963-7 , pp. 213-230.

Web links

Commons : John Woo  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b cf. John Woo . In: Internationales Biographisches Archiv 01/2007 of January 6, 2007 (accessed on August 18, 2009 via Munzinger Online)
  2. ↑ cf. Primo Ballerino . In: Focus , September 22, 1997, No. 39, pp. 162-163
  3. ↑ cf. Biography in the All Movie Guide (English; accessed August 18, 2009)
  4. ↑ cf. Definitely . In: Stern, June 29, 2000, No. 27, p. 180
  5. ↑ cf. Film review by Thomas Binotto in film-dienst 14/2000 (accessed on August 18, 2009 via Munzinger Online)
  6. ↑ cf. Press release at labiennale.org, December 21, 2009 (accessed December 22, 2009)
personal data
SURNAME Woo, John
ALTERNATIVE NAMES 吴宇森 (simplified Chinese); 吳宇森 (traditional Chinese); Wú Yǔsēn (Pinyin)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Chinese-American director and film producer
DATE OF BIRTH May 1, 1946
PLACE OF BIRTH Guangzhou , Republic of China