Dayyan Eng — Director | Biography, Movies & Career

Biography

Dayyan Eng, known as Wu Shixian to audiences in Asia, is an American director, writer and producer of Chinese, English, and Persian ancestry, who grew up in three continents. He studied film arts at the University of Washington and transferred to the Beijing Film Academy, where he finished his undergraduate studies in directing. Eng's films have garnered accolades and awards for himself and actors he’s worked with, which have included top stars in Asia and Hollywood. Starting his career directing and producing numerous TV commercials for the Asian and global markets, Eng first gained recognition for his film Bus 44. The film premiered and won awards at the 2001 Venice Film Festival and 2002 Sundance Film Festival, and was invited to 2002 Cannes Film Festival "Directors' Fortnight" - becoming the first Chinese short film to be invited in all three festivals' history. The film was covered extensively in the Chinese media and was critically acclaimed in both China and Europe and gained TV and theatrical distribution in territories worldwide. In 2005, Eng wrote and directed his first feature film Waiting Alone, starring an ensemble cast of Chinese stars including Xia Yu, Li Bingbing, Gong Beibi, and featuring cameos from some of Asia's most well-known actors including Hong Kong superstar Chow Yun-fat. Waiting Alone became a hit and went on to receive 3 nominations (including Best Picture) at the Chinese academy awards -- the first ever in the history of the awards by a foreign director. The film remains the highest-rated romantic comedy in China to date on Douban and other review sites as of 2023.

In 2007, Eng was invited to direct the first-ever opening short for the Chinese academy awards ceremony. He got some of Asia’s biggest stars, Ziyi Zhang, Liu Ye and Ge You, to spoof the action-movie genre in a humorous send-up on China's national TV. In 2011, Eng wrote, directed, and produced Inseparable starring Oscar-winner Kevin Spacey, Daniel Wu, Gong Beibi, Yan Ni, and Peter Stormare. The quirky psychological suspense/dramedy debuted at the Busan International Film Festival in 2011 to positive reviews and was released in China in May 2012. Inseparable was named as one of The Wall Street Journal’s Top 10 Most Notable Asian Films of the Year.

Eng directed, co-wrote and produced the 2017 indie fantasy-comedy Wished (co-written by Justin Malen), which beat local box office estimates at the time to gross RMB$70 million in two weeks. It held the highest audience scores (averaging 8.0/10) for live-action comedies released that summer, and gained a total of 100,000,000 paid views across the top three online movie platforms in just over a fortnight. Wished starred Xia Yu, Yan Ni, K-pop star Victoria Song along with cameos from China’s biggest names including Daniel Wu, Wang Baoqiang, Ning Jing. Wished went on to win a Golden Angel Award at the 2017 Chinese American Film Festival, Best Fantasy Film and Best Director awards at the LA Film Awards and New York Film Awards in 2018. It was also an official selection at the 37th Hawaii International Film Festival. Wished was subsequently optioned by a US production company to be remade into a Hollywood film, with Eng attached to executive produce and optionally direct. Eng divides his time between Los Angeles and Beijing. He’s multilingual, and reads and writes English, Chinese, and Farsi.