With the 36th Hong Kong International Film Festival coming to a close, there was another event important that took place this year – the annual FILMART, which allows for industry folks to take a closer look at film projects that are in different production stages. With local production continuing to fall in numbers, it serves as a hopeful look towards the near future. Here are some upcoming Hong Kong productions we’re currently keeping tabs on.
Last year, we interviewed Heiward Mak for her made-for-TV movie “Beside(s,) Happiness”, since then we were anxiously waiting for her next move – and finally her project with Emperor Motion Pictures “DIVA” has completed principle shooting, and is currently in post-production. It centers about super famous pop star feeling exhausted both mentally and physically exhausted, and while she takes a break from the music biz, she finds a new star emerging to rival her status.
Another film from the Emperor Motion Pictures line up that deserves our attention should be “The Bullet Vanishes”, currently in post-production, the film is directed by Derek Yee, also starring both past Best Actor winners Lau Ching-wan, Nicolas Tse as characters that have been pulled into a world of corruption, conspiracy and mystery between the police and crime load. This story is set in warlord era in China.
“Floating City” starring Aaron Kwok is directed by past best director of Hong Kong film awards Yim Ho, it is also his first movie project in seven years. The film chronicles a tale of a foreign looking fisherman son, his rise to the power in the 90s Hong Kong while searching for the secret of his identity and birth. Produced by Mandarin Films, it is currently in post-production stage.
Moving on, we find another highly anticipated big budgeted film in “The Guillotines”. Produced by the filmmaker in focus at this year’s HKIFF Peter Ho-Sun Chan, this is about an elite fighting team working for Chinese Qing Dynasty’s government using weapon guillotine to hunt supposedly criminals. This film will star previous Golden Horse best actor Ethan Ruan. The project was first reported earlier last year, making for an especially long wait.
One of the most talked about films this year is certainly the Peng Ho-Cheung directed “Love In the Buff”, which is a sequel to his previous popular work “Love In the Puff”. It shows that simplistic style driven romantic comedy still has the market and a big group of admirers. “Lacuna” is another similar looking romantic comedy produced by him, also starring “Love In the Puff” star Shawn Yu, directed by Derek Tsang and Jimmy Wan. It is a love tale about two strangers who just had one night stand, trying to piece their fragmented memories together to make sense of what happened.
Enko Films’ “Cold War” features probably the best ensemble cast to look forward this year, it stars Aaron Kwok, Tony Leung Ka Fai, Charlie Yeung, Eddie Peng from Taiwan and also Aarif Li who has won Best New actor before. The film is directed by two new first timers Longman Leung and Sunny Luk – the gist is simple: taking place during a hostage situation, the police slowly find out they are dealing with criminals much more dangerous than they realize.
Distributed by Media Asia Distribution, “Motorway” (see pic above) is directed by Soi Cheang (helmer behind the Venice & TIFF selected Accident), and promises a lot of fast car chases scenes and a plot-line that revolves around a hotshot rookie cop going after a bunch of bad guys. Johnnie To is on board as the producer, and in that role he can do no wrong.
As for films worth noting that are currently in development we have, “Dong Guan Wood” which definitely draws a lot of attention from the local folk as it is based on a sex story of same name, by an internet novelist “Xiang Xi Murakami Haruki” from the famous Hong Kong forum “hkgolden”. The story is later republished as real novel. The name of the story parodies the famous novel “Norwegian Wood”. Though a sex story, but it turned to be a cult hit among local internet users, its story is about a local commoner Frankie going north (Chinese mainland) with his friend James for dirty massage and sex, but the experience turns into an unexpected love affair. It will be written, directed by “Sex And Zen: Extreme Ecstasy” Writer Mark Wu. He may even play a small role in it.
