Wu Yonggang
吴永刚
Chinese director, 1907–1982. He worked first in art departments, and at twenty-seven wrote and directed his first film, The Goddess, with Ruan Lingyu. He went on to work in Shanghai and Beijing over several decades, directing more than twenty films.
Career
Wu trained in art and spent the 1920s as a set designer at several Shanghai studios. He directed for the first time in 1934, with The Goddess. Waves Washing the Sand, the following year, strands two men handcuffed together on a desert island, a subject with few parallels in Chinese films of the period.
He kept working in Shanghai after 1949 until he was labelled a rightist in 1957, after which he directed almost nothing for more than twenty years. He returned in 1980 with Evening Rain, co-directed with Wu Yigong, which shared the first Golden Rooster award for best feature with Legend of Tianyun Mountain.
