On January 31, 1922, Qin Yi was born in Shanghai.

　　On May 9, 2022, this witness and cultivator of China's 100-year history of film, this "people's artist" and "the most beautiful struggler", completed a full 100-year light and shadow life, at 4:08 in East China Hospital. Died at the age of one hundred.

　　She used to be the reborn progressive woman Yu Zhen in "Distant Love"; the witty and brave Mrs. Fanglin in "Railway Guerrilla"; the resolute scraper worker Ma Lan in "Malan Blossoms"; Lin Jie, who suffers but is still optimistic in "Basket No. 5", is also Lin Hong, a Communist Party member who sees death as his home and righteousness in "Song of Youth".

　　She used to be a doll in a big feudal family, with one elder brother and eight sisters. She was the only one to support herself in the toughest times. She used to have two unsuccessful marriages, one of which ended five years later. Divorce, a long separation after experiencing sweetness and betrayal, and finally leaving her to care for her son alone.

　　She has played many roles and left countless classic female images on the screen.

But perhaps the most resolute, brave and beautiful image she left to the times and to Chinese films is herself.

A lifetime of ups and downs, suffering, but also a lifetime of strength and tenacity, never fear or weakness, always gentle and calm.

　love movies, make movies

　　In 1922, Qin Yi was born in Pudong, Shanghai, into a feudal family.

Fortunately, the father who worked as a cashier in Jardine Matheson was more open-minded than many of his classmates' fathers, and often took Xiao Qin Yi to the movies, "You can watch a new movie for two cents. If it is an old movie, it only needs five points. "At that time, light and shadow quietly planted the seeds in the little girl's heart. "Film is really a very special art, not only with language, eyes, expressions, but even a small movement, can express people's heart. The world, so after I became a movie actor, I never wanted to do anything else."

　　According to Qin Yi's words, being able to become a movie actor is due to her "running away from home".

In 1938, 16-year-old Qin Yi, at the suggestion of her classmates, left Shanghai, traveled to Hong Kong to Wuhan, Hubei, and joined the anti-Japanese team with honor.

"At that time, I was young and ignorant, and regardless of the opposition of my family, it can be said that I went to the front line regardless of everything." So, she worked as a nurse, carried a stretcher, and supported the bloody anti-Japanese soldiers in front of her with the meager strength of a young girl.

And because of her good looks, Qin Yi was soon discovered and guided by "revolutionary seniors". In the same year, she entered the Chinese film studio as an intern actor, and participated in dramas and movies such as "I'm Thinking" and "Good Husband".

"That's how I embarked on the road of acting. From not being able to act to gradually becoming enlightened, it was through earnest acting and filming that I slowly learned the quality and accomplishment of being a good professional actor, and slowly realized being a Communist responsibility and responsibility.”

　　Do a line, love a line

　　In 1941, Qin Yi left the China Film Studio and joined the China Drama Society, where she became an actor.

"When I was in Chongqing, I played six dramas a year for 280 days, and I was the main character. I played the nurse in the battlefield, and the sister-in-law in the pavilion. As long as the Japanese didn't bomb, I would play." Others play tricks, and even later Qin Yi wrote a book called "Trading" to explain the "spirit of tricks" in her heart.

No other: do one line, love one line, special line, fine line, take every role seriously, every performance.

　　After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, Qin Yi returned to Shanghai.

When her father left, she carried the whole family, one movie after another.

"Anonymous" in 1947, "Distant Love" in 1948.

After the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, she became an actress at the Shanghai Film Studio and starred in the films "Love Lost" and "Mother".

1950 "Farmhouse", 1951 "Two Springs".

After a little rest, in 1956, Qin Yi completed two masterpieces, "Railway Guerrilla" and "Malan Blossoms"; in 1957, she starred in New China's first sports-themed color feature film "Women's Basketball No. 5"; in 1958, with Sun Daolin, Song Deyu cooperated to complete "Red Seed"; in 1959, he co-starred with Xie Fang and others in the film "Song of Youth" adapted from Yang Mo's novel of the same name, and in the same year also starred in "Lin Zexu" co-directed by Zheng Junli and Cen Fan... In the field of television, Qin Yi is also a pioneer and a role model. In 1982, she starred in the TV series "Under the Roof of Shanghai", and won the first popular TV Golden Eagle Award for outstanding actress for this drama.

Regarding honor, she said, "I really don't have much to do with myself." As for fame and fortune, she said, "All the money I earn supports my family. I really don't have much money, and I don't have any nice clothes, so I had to buy some blue cloth heads."

　how much to do

　　But even in blue cloth, Qin Yi is beautiful.

Her beauty is when surrounded by flowers.

Her beauty is even more beautiful after the prosperity is gone, and she is graceful and strong in the face of insults.

At the age of 86, Qin Yi donated his life savings to the earthquake-stricken area; at the age of 93, Qin Yi wrote, acted and raised funds to film the film "Qinghai Lakeside", which was full of enthusiasm.

"This story has been in my mind for ten years."

As a result, the touching story of female meteorological engineer Mei Xinyi's small home for the country, Qin Yi only spent one and a half months before and after completing the script of more than 30,000 words.

She said that because she shares the same breath and destiny with the characters in the play, the entire script was created "in one go."

At that time, someone thought about the health of the old man and persuaded her to set up a set in a studio in Shanghai, "Art creation is inseparable from reality. I must personally go down to live and go to the plateau for on-the-spot shooting. Only then can I come from life and be higher than life. Only then can you move the audience and be worthy of the audience." So, regardless of her age and body, she insisted on climbing the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau with the crew members, insisted on working on the front line of filming, and insisted on living and working until she was old, "We shoot on the plateau. After more than a month, I walked to 4,300 meters (altitude) by myself." It was almost seven years after the film was finished, and Tong Ruixin, the partner at that time, who was also a junior and the head of the Shanghai Film Actors Troupe, said: "I always remember what Teacher Qin Yi said, my My age is not determined by me, but my life can be determined by me, as long as I live, I have to work, and it is better to work than not to work.”

　　In the following years, Qin Yi participated in the costume movie "The Legend of the Demon Cat" directed by Chen Kaige. At the age of 95, she played an old mama who had witnessed the ups and downs of the Tang Dynasty.

Although it only took three days to film, Qin Yi still studied hard on the set. "As literary and artistic workers, it is necessary to learn a little about everything. As a film actor, although I have some experience, it is not enough."

　　In 2019, Qin Yi, who was 97 years old, also participated in the public welfare film "Everything Is Like You" during her convalescence in East China Hospital.

In the camera, she made food for her husband and waited anxiously outside the ward. She was a little thin, but with silver hair and red lips, she was in good spirits with gold-rimmed glasses. In the camera, she participated in her first movie since 1939. "Good Husband", Qin Yi has been with the film for more than 80 years.

Off-camera, the 97-year-old performing artist that year, as the only representative of the film industry, won the national honorary title of "People's Artist" and the personal title of "Most Beautiful Struggle"; off-camera, at the end of January this year, the reporter was in East China Hospital for the last time. When the ward saw Qin Yi, she was sitting quietly in front of the glass window of the ward, and there were photos of her birthdays in the past few years on the table.

Seeing time passing by gently, seeing her smile year after year, Qin Yi smiled again, as calm and beautiful as ever.

　　Sun Jiayin, chief reporter of Xinmin Evening News