Zhao Tao
Birthday: 1977-01-28
Place of Birth: Taiyuan - Shanxi - China
Synopsis
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Zhao Tao (Chinese: 赵涛, born 28 January 1977) is a famous Chinese actress, work in China and Europe, she has over 10 films to her credit since starting her career in 1999, muse of director Jia Zhangke. Zhao first came into international prominence through close collaboration with Chinese director Jia Zhangke and is credited with helping to bring Chinese cinema to Europe, especially Italy. As Shun Li in Io sono Li, her best starring role to date, she became the first Asian actress to win a prize at David di Donatello. Zhao's native language is Jinese, but she is multilingual, having learned to speak Italian, Mandarin and Szechuanese.
Biography
She was born January 28, 1977, in Taiyuan, Shanxi, which is also the hometown of the heroine in Still Life. As a child, she studied classical Chinese dance. In 1996, she enrolled in the folk dance department at Beijing Dance Academy. After graduation, she became a dance teacher in Taiyuan Normal College, where she was spotted by Jia during casting for Platform. Since then they work frequently together.
In 2011 she starred in the Italian movie Shun Li and the Poet by Andrea Segre, the movie was screened in the Venice Days section of the 68th Venice International Film Festival.
Zhao won the David di Donatello Award, the Italian Oscar, for Best Actress for her bilingual role.
Acting
Jia Zhangke, A Guy from Fenyang
as Self
Chinese filmmaker Jia Zhangke returns to the shooting locations of his films, along with his actors, friends and close collaborators. Jia recalls the inspiration sources for his movies, such as Platform, Still Life and A Touch of Sin. The film is the memory of a filmmaker and of a country in convulsion, China, which reveals itself little by little.
A Touch of Sin
as Xiao Yu
Four independent stories set in modern China about random acts of violence.
Shun Li and the Poet
as Shun Li
A study of the friendship between a Chinese woman and a fisherman who came to Italy from Yugoslavia many years ago, who live in a small city-island in the Veneto lagoon.
24 City
as Su Na
24 City chronicles the dramatic closing of a once-prosperous state-owned factory in Chengdu, southwest China and its conversion into a sprawling luxury apartment complex. Three generations, eight characters : old workers, factory executives and yuppies, their stories melt into the History of China.
![]()
Unknown Pleasures
as Qiao Qiao
Three disaffected youths live in Datong in 2001, part of the new "Birth Control" generation. Fed on a steady diet of popular culture, both Western and Chinese, the characters of Unknown Pleasures represent a new breed in the People's Republic of China, one detached from reality through the screen of media and the internet.
![]()
Platform
as Yin Ruijuan
China's rapid changes from the late-1970s to the early 1990s, as seen through the lives of four performers in a theater troupe.
