Joan Chen makes supporting characters worth staying with. We value her ability to suggest unhappiness without announcing it, though The Last Emperor leaves us wishing the film would give her more time.
Fi1m perspective
In The Last Emperor (1987), Joan Chen's Wan Jung has an unhappiness that survives all the imperial ceremony around her. Chen does not need an explanatory speech to make it felt. We were moved by the way she suggested distress without asking the film to pause and underline it. Bernardo Bertolucci's absorbing historical drama can keep its adult protagonist at a frustrating distance. Chen gives us someone whose feelings we want to understand, even when the story is hurrying elsewhere.
That restraint matters because the surrounding performances are not always so supple. Peter O'Toole's Reginald Johnston brings a welcome lightness, but some exchanges elsewhere remain stiff. Chen makes the emotional distance feel like something a person is living through, rather than simply a problem with the drama. There is a limit to what she can do with the time allotted: as individual relationships become hurried, we miss the fuller part she might have had.
Her roles have not always rewarded that skill. Little Flower (1979) made her a teenage star in China, before The Last Emperor brought an international breakthrough. She worked with David Lynch as Josie Packard in Twin Peaks (1990). Hollywood's tendency to cast her as exotic or villainous figures restricted the parts available to her. There is something wasteful about hiring an actor who can suggest a complicated private life and then repeatedly asking her to be mysterious.
Frustration with the available parts helped take her into directing with Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl (1998). Autumn in New York (2000) followed, while the acting continued across American and Chinese productions. Her work as Mrs Yee in Ang Lee's Lust, Caution (2007) is another reason not to judge her acting career solely by the parts Hollywood found for her.
The renewed attention for her grounded performance as Chungsing Wang in Dìdi (2024) is welcome. A contemporary family drama gives her something beyond the familiar assignments in mystery and imperial unhappiness. For a first encounter, though, we would choose The Last Emperor. Allow for some stiff exchanges around her, and do not expect her to have as much screen time as we would like.
Biography
Joan Chen, also credited as Chen Chong, is a Chinese-born American actress and director. Born in Shanghai, she trained at the Shanghai Film Academy and began her career in China.
She rose to prominence in her native country with her performance in the 1979 film Little Flower, for which she won China's Best Actress award. Chen moved to the United States in 1981 and gained international recognition for her role as Wan Jung in Bernardo Bertolucci's The Last Emperor (1987).
She is also known for her work in the television series Twin Peaks (1990) and for directing the feature film Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl (1998).
