Celebrating Lin Dai

Lin Dai, as she appeared in Spring Is in the Air (1954)

Last Friday was the opening of the Hong Kong Film Archive's tribute to Lin Dai, "The Legend & The Beauty". The above photo (thanks Oldflames!), from the cover of a March 1954 issue of World Today, shows her when she was a bright young star rising on the horizon. Who would have thought that ten years later, at the peak of her career, she would take her own life.

The fall of Lin Dai struck a deep chord with Chinese audiences. News of her death was even reported in the American press. According to one account, "wailing women broke police lines ... and threw themselves on the hearse carrying the body of ... Lin Dai to her grave. More than 400 police wrestled with a crowd estimated at 60,000" (Long Beach Independent, July 20, 1964). Such a huge outpouring of grief had not been seen since the death of Shanghai superstar Ruan Lingyu (who also committed suicide) twenty-nine years earlier.

After Lin Dai's death, her husband Lung Shun-shing kept the furnishings and possessions in their room undisturbed for more than 40 years. Meant as a memorial to his departed wife, it was also a time capsule of an era long vanished. When Mr. Lung passed away in 2007, his son Lung Tzong-hann donated Linda's personal artifacts to the Hong Kong Film Archive. These items — furniture, fashion accessories, oil and photo portraits, award trophies, costumes, and other precious archival materials — are now on display at the Archive.

While I've never counted myself as a Lin Dai fan, I feel very fortunate that my upcoming trip to Hong Kong is coinciding with this rare opportunity to appreciate the life of Hong Kong's beloved movie queen.