Brigitte Lin

Brigitte Lin Ching-hsia (; born 3 November 1954) is a Taiwanese actress. Regarded as a screen icon, Lin played a key role in boosting Taiwan's film production with her romantic heroine roles in the 1970s before transitioning to Hong Kong, where she achieved great success with her androgynous roles in wuxia films. Following her marriage in 1994, she retired from acting and transitioned to writing in the 2000s, publishing four essay collections. In 2023, she received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 60th Golden Horse Awards.

Career Lin was born in Chiayi, Taiwan to waishengren parents from eastern Shandong who had moved to Taiwan in the KMT exodus in 1949. She has a sister and a brother. She was scouted in 1972 on the streets of Taipei by a film producer after she finished women's high school and was preparing for university. Lin debuted in the film adaptation of Chiung Yao's Outside the Window (1973), which propelled her to stardom. She subsequently joined Chiung Yao's company in 1976.

She appeared in 55 films in the period between 1972 and 1979, and all her roles were romantic heroines in love stories, many based on Chiung Yao's stories.

Lin branched out of Taiwan with her collaborations with Hong Kong New Wave directors Ringo Lam, Tsui Hark and Jackie Chan in Zu Warriors from the Magic Mountain (1983), The Other Side of Gentleman (1984), Police Story (1985) and Peking Opera Blues (1986), establishing her as a screen icon. In 1990, she won the Best Actress at the 27th Golden Horse Awards for her depiction of a Chinese female writer who fell in love with a Japanese collaborator in Red Dust (1990).

Lin gained particular acclaim for her androgynous roles, which are common in Chinese operas and movies. In Peking Opera Blues (1986), she was a guerrilla revolutionary and in Royal Tramp II (1992), she was the leader of the Heavenly Dragon Sect, while in Handsome Siblings (1992), she was a highly skilled successor of a martial arts leader, then in Fire Dragon (1994), she was a fire-wielding assassin. All four were female characters dressed as men. And in Ashes of Time (1994), she played twin brother/sister duo Yin and Yang. The success of the film brought her to other notable martial epics such as New Dragon Gate Inn (1992), where she again played a female character dressed as a man, and The Bride with White Hair (1993), until she retired from acting after Ashes of Time (1994).

Personal life Lin dated both Chin Han and Charlie Chin of the "Two Chins, Two Lins" fame in the 1970s.

Lin married Hong Kong businessman Michael Ying in 1994. She is the mother of Eileen Ying Oi Lum (born 1996) and Melani Ying Yin-oi (born 2001) and stepmother to Claudine Ying.

In 2002, Lin's 71-year-old mother, who struggled with depression, committed suicide by jumping off the 12th floor of her apartment.

Filmography Film

Television YearEnglish titleChinese titleRole Notes2015 Up Idol 偶像来了 Herself Reality show

Awards and nominations Lin's hand print and autograph at the Avenue of Stars in Hong Kong.

Related publications The Last Star of the East: Brigitte Lin Ching Hsia and Her Films (2005) 窗裏窗外 Inside and Outside the Window (2011) 雲去雲來 Cloud Goes, Cloud Comes (2014) 青霞小品 Ching-hsia Sketches (2022)