Zhao Tao

Born: 1977-01-28

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.


Placeholder

A Touch of Sin

as Xiao Yu
Released: 2013-10-04

Four independent stories set in modern China about random acts of violence.

Movie page

Caught by the Tides

as Qiao Qiao
Released: 2024-11-22

Years after her boyfriend left her for the big city and promised to bring her there after he’s...

Movie page

Still Life

as Shen-Hong Guo
Released: 2006-11-16

A town in Fengjie county is gradually being demolished and flooded to make way for the Three...

Movie page

An Elephant Sitting Still

as History Teacher
Released: 2018-12-14

In the northern Chinese city of Manzhouli, they say there is an elephant that simply sits and...

Movie page

Ash Is Purest White

as Zhao Qiao
Released: 2018-09-21

Set in China's underworld, this tale of love and betrayal follows a dancer who fired a gun to...

Movie page

Platform

as Yin Ruijuan
Released: 2001-08-29

China's rapid changes from the late 1970s to the early 1990s, as seen through the lives of four...

Movie page

Shun Li and the Poet

as Shun Li
Released: 2011-09-23

A study of the friendship between a Chinese woman and a fisherman who came to Italy from...

Movie page

Mountains May Depart

as Shen Tao
Released: 2015-10-30

The life of Tao, and those close to her, is explored in three different time periods: 1999,...

Movie page

24 City

as Su Na
Released: 2008-09-27

As a decades-old state-run aeronautics munitions factory in downtown Chengdu, China is being...

Movie page

Unknown Pleasures

as Qiao Qiao
Released: 2002-06-06

Two disaffected, unemployed Chinese youth drift through life on the streets of their industrial...

Movie page

The World

as Tao
Released: 2004-09-01

At Beijing World Park, a bizarre cross-pollination of Las Vegas and Epcot Center where visitors...

Movie page

Cry Me a River

as uncredited
Released: 2008-07-11

An ancestral city; through its delicious botanical garden and its branched canals, we observe...

Movie page

I Wish I Knew

as Self
Released: 2010-07-02

Focuses on the people, their stories and architecture spanning from the mid-1800s, when Shanghai...

Movie page

Revive

as uncredited
Released: 2017-06-15

Revive is one of five short films within the Jia Zhangke-produced omnibus film Where Has Time...

Movie page

Our Ten Years

as uncredited
Released: 2007-09-29

Throughout ten years of a key era in Chinese and Hong Kong history, a girl becomes fixated on a...

Movie page

Jia Zhangke, A Guy from Fenyang

as Self
Released: 2014-10-20

Chinese filmmaker Jia Zhangke returns to the shooting locations of his films, along with his...

Movie page

Ten Thousand Waves

as Blue Goddess
Released: 2010-10-13

TEN THOUSAND WAVES is a 9-screen installation shot on location in China. The work poetically...

Movie page

Walking on the Wild Side

as uncredited
Released: 2006-03-24

Han Jie’s feature debut draws on his own experiences growing up in a desolate mining district in...

Movie page

3.11 A Sense of Home

as (segment "Alone Together")
Released: 2011-11-04

In memory of the Japanese earthquake on 3.11, each director presents a 3 minute and 11 second...

Movie page

Where Has Time Gone?

as uncredited
Released: 2017-10-19

A short film omnibus featuring the work of five directors representing five countries involved...

Movie page

Remembrance

as uncredited
Released: 2008-11-29

Jia Zhangke’s short for Modern Weekly’s special tenth anniversary issue.

Movie page

Black Breakfast

as uncredited
Released: 2008-10-23

Short-movie from Stories on Human Rights, 2008.

Movie page

Smog Journeys

as uncredited
Released: 2015-01-22

Jia Zhangke's short film for Greenpeace East Asia depicts the effects of air pollution in...

Movie page

Living

as Hong Yu
First aired: 2009-03-18

TV Show page