18.1.8. Chloe Zhao (Zhao Ting, 赵婷, 2021 Oscar winner, 获第93奥斯卡最佳电影和导演奖)

Born and raised in China, sent to study in the UK by her wealthy father Zhao Yuji 赵玉吉 at age 15 and later moved to US, but retained Chinese citizenship as far as is publicly known.

In 2013 she told the magazine Filmmaker https://web.archive.org/web/20130814185314/https://filmmakermagazine.com/people/chloe-zhao/ (later removed from the website):

It goes back to when I was a teenager in China, being in a place where there are lies everywhere. You felt like you were never going to be able to get out. A lot of info I received when I was younger was not true, and I became very rebellious toward my family and my background. I went to England suddenly and relearned my history. Studying political science in a liberal arts college was a way for me to figure out what is real. Arm yourself with information, and then challenge that too.

TODO was that the only comment she ever made or is there more?

Won the 2021 Oscar (93rd) for best picture and best director on 2021-04-25 for her film Nomadland 无依之地.

And at the same time she was also working on an idiotic superhero movie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternals_(film) to be launched by Disney in the future, and therefore they would likely want it to be released in China, let’s see how that will go.

On 2021-04-26 reports emerged that her win was being censored in China: https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-censors-nomadland-director-chloe-zhaos-oscar-win-11619440550 Unlike Hao Haidong (郝海东, 2020, soccer player) however, the order was much more specific: to censor only the fact that she won the Oscars.

As of 2021-04-27 her Baidu Baike (百度百科, Chinese censored Wikipedia clone) page https://baike.baidu.com/item/赵婷/22214113 was still up: https://web.archive.org/web/20210427075523/https://baike.baidu.com/item/赵婷/22214113 let’s see how long it lasts. But the page failed to mention the minor detail that she on the Oscar. The comment section, which we’re unable to archive contained two types comments:

  • she’s an American citizen now, not Chinese, just it wasn’t reported. But no one has any proof.

  • she won the Oscar

The page for the 93rd Oscar mysteriously does not exit however: https://baike.baidu.com/item/第93届奥斯卡金像奖 unlike that of all others: https://baike.baidu.com/item/第92届奥斯卡金像奖 (archive) We can’t find an archive either, but it is overwhelmingly likely that it was created and later deleted. As of 2021-06-21, https://baike.baidu.com/item/奥斯卡金像奖/739020#5 (archive) contains a list of all the prizes given so far, linking to the respective per year pages, and the 93rd appears listed but mysteriously without a link.

On Zhihu (知乎, censored Quora clone, 审查 Quora 克隆) the topic 93rd Oscar "第93 届奥斯卡金像奖" https://www.zhihu.com/topic/21594057 was deleted:

The Chloe Zhao topic https://www.zhihu.com/topic/20175085/hot was still up: 2021-04-27 with 8 questions: https://archive.ph/wip/CI3vz but funnily that website is so shit that it still links to some deleted questions e.g.: which used to read https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/368060294 "赵婷获第93届奥斯卡最佳导演奖,有思想的女孩子最可爱" but is down https://archive.ph/wip/6eiTl

Some archived deleted threads:

  • https://www.zhihu.com/question/420850041 (archive) 如何评价中国导演赵婷作品《无依之地》获得第 77 届威尼斯电影节最高奖金狮奖? What do you think about Chloe Zhao’s work nomadland that won the 77th Venice Film Festival

The page of the film is still up 2021-04-27 https://baike.baidu.com/item/无依之地/50656178 (archive).

Some coverage:

Chloe Zhao won 93rd Oscar
Figure 233. Chloe Zhao (Zhao Ting, 赵婷, 2021 Oscar winner, 获第93奥斯卡最佳电影和导演奖) holding the 2021 Oscars for best director and best film. The fact that she won was censored in China because she made one single negative comment about the CCP in 2013.