Hong Kong Film Festival 2007

Commemorating the Hong Kong handover to China & responding to the emergence of Hong Kong film over the past quarter century as a window into life in Hong Kong & Asia


Asian Institute at the University of Toronto,
Hong Kong Economic & Trade Office (Canada),
&
Reel Asian International Film Festival
present

From the Queen
to the Chief Executive:
Hong Kong Films
10 Years After the Handover

May 4-6
FRIDAY-SUNDAY

Tickets

$7 Single Film (other than Opening Night film)
$17 3-Screening Pass (3 other than Opening Night film)
$45 Festival Pass (includes Opening Night film & party)

$15 Opening Night Screening & Party
$10 Opening Night Party Only

Panel Discussions Free with ticket.

My Life as McDull is Free for kids when accompanied by an adult.

COMPLETE FILM FESTIVAL CATALOGUE

The UofT Hong Kong Film Festival will run from May 4 to 6, and will commemorate, through the medium of film, the Hong Kong handover to China. The festival is a collaborative effort between the Munk Centre's Asian Institute, Reel Asian International Film Festival, and the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office, in response to the emergence of Hong Kong film over the past quarter century as a window into life in Hong Kong and Asia.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

SCHEDULE


May 4
FRIDAY

ROM Theatre
100 Queen’s Park Cres
(except where indicated otherwise)

7:30-9:30pm
Welcoming Remarks
Opening Film - Isabella (Toronto Premiere) (directed by Ho-Cheung Pang) (90 min.)

9:30-10pm
Q&A

10pm-1am
Opening Night Party
(at Munk Centre for International Studies, South House, 1 Devonshire Place)


May 5
SATURDAY

Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue

10-11:25am
Jaime Lo, Small and Shy (directed by Lillian Chan) (8 min.)
My Life as McDull (directed by Toe Yuen) (75 min.)

11:35am-12:35pm
Animation & Comics Panel

1:30-2:30pm
Keynote Conversation

2:30-4:15pm
Banana Bruises (directed by Joyce Wong) (12 min.)
Dumplings (directed by Fruit Chan) (91 min.)

4:15-5:15pm
Horror Panel

6:30-8:35pm
Eastbound (directed by Rita Tse) (15.5 min.)
Lost in Time (directed by Derek Yee Tung See) (109 min.)

9-11pm
Asthma Tech (directed by Jonathan Ng) (7 min.)
One Night in Mongkok (directed by Derek Yee) (110 min.)


May 6
SUNDAY

Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue

1-2:30pm
My Matsura (directed by Lesley Chan) (6.5 min.)
The Heavenly Kings (directed by Daniel Wu) (83 min.)

2:30-3:30pm
Hong Kong Film Industry Panel

4-5:50pm
Closing Film - From the Queen to the Chief Executive (directed by Herman Yao) (110 min.)


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


SYNOPSES


Isabella
(2006)
Director: Ho-Cheung Pang
Screenwriters: Ho-Cheung Pang, Karen Pang, Derek Song, and Jimmy Wan
Cast: Chapman To, Isabella Leong, J.J. Jia Derek Tsang, Meme Tan, Anthony Wong, Shawn Yue, Josie Ho, Jim Chim
90 minutes
In the summer of 1999, Macau is about to be returned by Portugal to China. A bachelor policeman, Shing (Chapman To) faces suspension for cigarette smuggling. He knows that he is the fall guy for the whole set-up and finds himself gun-less, badge-less, and at loose ends. So, Shing does what he has done all his life, he hits the bars. There he finds a young woman, Yan, (Isabella Leong) but she provides a very different encounter than Shing expected. Yan is the daughter that he never knew he had. Her recently deceased mother was his teen love and after they split, after what was supposed to have been an abortion, they never spoke and now Shing discovers an unknown past. Gruff as he may be toward her when she insists on moving into his place, Yan offers him a future that he never imagined. This beautifully shot (by Charlie Lam) and elliptically edited (Wenders Li) drama is an intently emotional meditation on loss and recovery set in Macau, Hong Kong’s tropical entertainment adjunct about to set upon its own adventure into a fresh future.
Ho-Cheung Pang is a novelist, screenwriter and director. He has written over a dozen novels, including the bestseller, Full Time Killer. In addition to Isabella, Ho-Cheung Pang’s extensive writing and directing credits include A.V. (2005), Beyond Our Ken (2003), Men Suddenly in Black (2003) and You Shoot, I Shoot (2001).

May4 Friday
Royal Ontario Museum Theatre
100 Queen’s Park
7:40–9:10pm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jaime Lo, Small and Shy
(2006)
By: Lillian Chan
8 minutes
Jaime Lo is a small and shy Chinese-Canadian girl. She misses her father, who works in Hong Kong in order to support their family. When patience runs out, Jaime must cope with his absence with her creativity. Funny how a little brain works to sustain hope – maybe it’s something all grownups should learn.


My Life As McDull
(2001)
Director: Toe Yuen
Screenwriter: Brian Tse
Producer: Brian Tse
Music: Steve Ho
Editor: Teo Yuen
Cast: Lee Chun-wai (child McDull), Jan Lamb (adult McDull), Sandra Ng, Antony Wong, The Pancakes
75 minutes
Surprise winner of the FIPRESCI prize at the 26th Hong Kong International Film Festival (2002), the animated feature My Life As McDull is a post-1997 adaptation of a series of comic books conceived by Alice Mak and Brian Tse in the early 90s. In voiceover, the grown McDull, a piglet in a world populated by both cute animals and humans, takes us through a series of set pieces involving his birth, education, and training as would-be Olympian – with excursions to his mother’s TV cooking show and the Maldives. Musical accompaniment is provided by a series of adorably jovial nonsense songs set to ruminatively elegiac classical piano pieces by Schubert and Schumann. McDull is funny and affectionately satirical. Its surface cuteness sweetens an acidic core. The film comically identifies the pressures and contradictions of growing up in Hong Kong. The film is intensely local in its play with Cantonese slang and cultural in-jokes. The hand-drawn animation is weaved with computerized graphical re-creations of Hong Kong sites (including Tai Kok Tsui, Cheung Chau Island, The Peak). The theme of McDull reaches beyond the constraints of locality, however, and is pleasing to international audiences of all ages.
Toe Yuen attended the Department of Communications at Baptist College, obtaining a major in Film. He is a comic book editor, script-writer, special effects and computer animator and a toy and figure designer. Other directing credits include the animation shorts, Explanations (1995) and Foulball (1996). My Life as McDull is Toe Yuen’s first animated feature film.

This film is Free for kids when accompanied by an adult

Animation and Comics Panel to follow

May5 Saturday
Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue
10:00–11:25am

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Banana Bruises
(2006)
By: Joyce Wong
12 minutes
Chole, a Chinese-Canadian girl, has had her eye on her shy and quiet Caucasian classmate, Matthew, since they were kids. Now that they are consenting adults, would he consider a ‘special’ intimate encounter? Banana Bruises is a satire on inter-racial intimacy with a horrific twist in the very last line of the story.


Dumplings
(2004)
Director: Fruit Chan
Screenwriter: Lilian Lee
Producer: Peter Chan Ho-Sun
Cast: Miriam Yeung Chin-Wah, Bai Ling, Tony Leung Ka-Fai, Miki Yeung Oi-Gan
91 minutes
Dumplings is the ninety-minute expansion of director Fruit Chan’s forty-minute segment of producer Peter Chan’s omnibus Three… Extremes.
Ching (Miriam Yeung), a fading middle-aged woman, once a Hong Kong TV star, settles herself at the apartment of Mei (Bai Ling), a very strange and voluble woman who boasts to Ching about her expensive dumplings. Ching is not, however, merely sitting down to a very exclusive lunch. Semitransparent on the outside and alarmingly pinkish within, it is not the dumplings’ taste that Ching is after, but Mei’s promises that they will transform a middle-aged woman into a goddess bursting with sexually-appealing youth. Fruit Chan applies a deliberate style to Lilian (Farewell My Concubine) Lee’s script but wastes little time revealing Mei’s mystery meat. The film takes an attitude of cruel indifference closer to Luis Buñuel’s surrealism than horror movie shock tactics. The juxtaposition of the beautiful and disgusting is refracted in Christopher Doyle’s cinematography and growing radiance of Miriam Yeung’s skin. Dumplings is almost otherworldly in its beauty but beneath that surface lies ultimate disgust and horror. This film is an extreme examination of women’s obsession with youth and beauty in a gender-biased society.
Fruit Chan was born in China, but raised, since the age of ten, and educated in Hong Kong, Fruit Chan is a graduate of the Hong Kong Film Centre. Fruit Chan’s directing credits include the highly acclaimed series of three films on the handover to China, Made in Hong Kong, The Longest Summer, and Little Cheung. In 2000, he made Durian Durian, which was awarded the best script award at the Hong Kong Film Awards and Best Film from the Hong Kong film critics.

Horror Panel to follow

May5 Saturday
Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue
2:30-4:15pm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Eastbound
(2004)
By: Rita Tse
15.5 minutes
“Women without knowledge are graced by virtue” – ancient Chinese Proverb. Is this still true in the 2000s? The parallel juxtaposition of a modern-day unfulfilled housewife alongside the Chinese silent movie superstar, Ruan Ling-yu, seems to show they have a lot in common. Eastbound is a well composed film exploring the position of women in modern-day society.


Lost in Time
(2003)
Director: Derek Yee Tung See
Screenplay: James Yuen, Jessica Fong
Producers: Tiffany Chen, Henry Fong
Cast: Cecilia Cheung, Lau Ching-wan, Daichi Harashima, Louis Koo, Chin Pei 109 minutes
Cecilia Cheung won the Hong Kong Film Award for best actress for her role as Siu Wai in director Derek Yee’s Lost in Time. The story begins with Siu’s Wai’s fiancé’s death in a mini-bus accident. Despite her family’s disapproval, Siu Wai’s takes on responsibility of his five-year-old son Lok Lok (Daichi Harashima). Her fiancé was a driver and Siu decides to have his bus repaired (it’s where they met) and to resume his route. Her struggle is not easy in this a romantic melodrama, which never leaves much room for whimsy. Her only ally is Dai Fai (Lau Ching-Wan), her lover’s friend and colleague. Their journey of struggle and despair earn them new insights about love, hope and their innermost desires. This is not your traditional boy meets girl romantic narrative, but an honest examination of human relationships in modern society. Critics have agreed that Lost in Time is the best romantic drama to appear in Hong Kong in years.
Derek Yee began acting after graduating from high school, and has appeared in over forty movies. Lee’s directorial debut occurred in 1986 with The Lunatics. Directing credits include C’est la vie, mon chéri, Viva Erotica, The Truth About Jane and Sam, Full Throttle and Drink-Drank-Drunk.

May5 Saturday
Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue
6:30-8:35pm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Asthma Tech
(2006)
By: Jonathan Ng
7 minutes
Trying to fit in has always been a challenge for immigrants, especially when you are a visible minority. Little Winston’s challenges were even greater, since his chronic Asthma holds him back from fitting in with his peers. He delves into his own creative mind and Asthma Tech, comic superhero, comes to his rescue.


One Nite in Mongkok
(2004)
Director and Screenwriter: Derek Yee
Second Unit (Action) Director: Luk Kim-Ming
Producers: Alvin Lam and Henry Fong
Cast: Daniel Wu, Cecilia Cheung, Alex Fong, Kar Lok Chin, Ken Wong, Lam Suet, Eddie Pang
110 minutes
Derek Yee won the 2004 Hong Kong Film Awards for best direction and screenplay with this crime thriller set in the densely populated and notorious Hong Kong neighborhood Mongkok. Police struggle to prevent a gangland murder planned after a tense standoff between rival crime lords Tim and Carl, over the death of Tim’s son in a car accident caused by one of Carl’s flunkies. A sleazy murder broker arranges for a hit man to murder Carl. But this is not your traditional hit man; upon his arrival, the contract killer reveals himself to be a bespeckled neophyte mainlander Lai Fu (Daniel Wu) who does not know his way around. He hooks up with a prostitute (Cecilia Cheung) after saving her from a violent customer only to discover that they are from the same mainland village. With her help, Lai tries to contact his broker to locate the target. Meanwhile, Officer Milo (Alex Fong) races to prevent the bloodbath he knows will result from the hit. One Nite in Mongkok is at once a highly wrought genre movie and a carefully woven tour of the neighborhood’s streets and alleys. Critics have recognized the film as an ambitious and thematically complex commercial movie, offering much more than its crime story premise seemingly suggests.
Derek Yee began acting after graduating from high school, and has appeared in over forty movies. Lee’s directorial debut occurred in 1986 with The Lunatics. Directing credits include C’est la vie, mon chéri, Viva Erotica, The Truth About Jane and Sam, Full Throttle and Drink-Drank-Drunk.

May5 Saturday
Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue
9:00-11:00pm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My Matsura
(2006)
By: Lesley Chan
6.5 minutes
Pioneer photographer Frank Matsura came to Concully, Washington from Japan in 1903. He worked as a kitchen helper during the day and developed his negatives at the kitchen sink at night. His story is captured onto negatives and retouched in this lyrical experimental documentary.


The Heavenly Kings
(2006)
Director: Daniel Wu
Producer: Daniel Wu, Andrew Lin Hoi, Terence Yin, Conroy Chan Chi-Chung
Cast: Daniel Wu, Andrew Lin Hoi, Terence Yin, Conroy Chan Chi-Chung
83 minutes
The Heavenly Kings is part fact, part fiction, part animated, and all of it is very funny. The focus of this ‘mocumentary’ is the Hong Kong boy band Alive, which debuted in 2005. The B-list actors who make up the group, Daniel Wu, Terence Yin, Andrew Lin, and Conroy Chan, cannot sing, dance, or play instruments. They have yet to release an album. This film is the story of their attempt to rise into Cantopop stardom. Shot-on-digital-video, the film asks how a talent-deprived group of amateurs makes it in the Hong Kong music market. The answer: manipulation of the mass media and use of technology. By auto-tuning their off-key voices to falsely claim that they were victims of piracy, the singer wannabes rise to popularity through non-conventional means.
The Heavenly Kings follows Alive in their journey towards stardom, and shows actual events including the initial press conference, their product endorsements and public performances as well as developing fictional storylines about the members’ tumultuous relationships. The film is a social commentary on media, cul-ture, and Hong Kong’s dysfunctional music industry. The actors’ social experiment is interspersed with many talking head interviews with top artists in the indus-try like Jacky Cheung, Paul Wong of Beyond, Nicholas Tse, Miriam Yeung, Candy Lo, Karen Mok, and others. Wu’s honest and original attempt may seem childish at times, but there is enough sympathy here to keep The Heavenly Kings from turning sour.
Daniel Wu was born and raised in the U.S. and obtained a degree in architecture in San Francisco. He subsequently began modeling in Hong Kong, then acting, producing, writing and directing. Acting credits include Young and Dangerous, The Prequel, Headlines, Cop on a Mission, and Love Undercover. The Heavenly Kings is his directorial debut.

Hong Kong Industry Panel to follow

May6 Sunday
Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue
1:00-2:30pm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

From the Queen to the Chief Executive
(2001)
Director: Herman Yau
Screenwriter: Elsa Chan
Producers: Charles Heung, Nam Yin
Cast: David Li Sheung-man, Ai-Jing, Stephan Tang Shu-wing, Sam Wong Cham-sum, Alison Wong Ting-ping, Cara Chu Chi-yee
110 minutes
Director Herman Yau’s social drama is situated in the context of the 1997 transfer of sovereignty from Britain to China. Based on Elsa Chan’s book reporting real events, the film begins six months before the handover. The film examines the treatment of Hong Kong prisoners detained at ‘the Chief Executive’s discretion,’ the incarceration for juvenile offenders without fixed-length terms. These terms of detention last longer than those given to adults convicted for similar crimes. The story serves as a reflection of Hong Kongers’ political uncertainty prior to the transition.
A college student, Cheung Yue-ling (Ai-jing), visits a prison to meet an inmate with whom she has been exchanging letters. The prisoner, Cheung Yau-ming (David Lee), had written an essay which bested hers in an Open University writing competition. Yue-ling asks the young man when he will be released; he has no answer.
As a juvenile offender in a 1985 criminal case, Cheung has been detained indefinitely. Along with other juvenile offenders, he is seeking determined sentencing before the British colonial government is replaced. Yue-ling (a fictional character) takes up the cause before the public, helping to assemble the prisoners’ families, holding protests and sit-ins to gain a last minute legislative review. Opinion is divided.
The prisoners’ family members fear public exposure, people on the street are indifferent, a prison official suggests the detainees deserve no reprieve, politicians see little voter enthusiasm for a gang of prisoners who committed violent crimes.
The story is harsh and engaging, and its treatment realistic and without resorting to melodrama.
Herman Yau graduated from film studies at Hong Kong Baptist College in 1984. Since then, he has worked as a writer, director, cinematographer and producer in Hong Kong. He has been involved in over 70 movies and his lead directorship includes The Untold Story, The Untold Story III, War of the Under World, Walk In, Ebola Syndrome, Master Q 2001, From the Queen to the Chief Executive and the thriller series of Troublesome Night.

May6 Sunday
Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue
4:00-5:50pm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

PANELS

Panel Discussions Free with ticket.


May4
Friday

Royal Ontario Museum Theatre
100 Queen’s Park

7:30-7:40pm
Welcoming Remarks
Joseph Wong (Asian Institute)
Bassanio So (Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (Canada))
mc: Linda Tse (Fairchild TV Film News Reporter)

9:10-9:30pm
Q & A
mc: Linda Tse (Fairchild TV Film News Reporter)


May5
Saturday

Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue

11:35am-12:35pm
Animation and Comics Panel
Panelists:
Wendy Wong (York University)
Chris Landreth (Academy Award Winning Animator)
Moderator: Elic Chan (University of Toronto)

1:30-2:30pm
Keynote Conversation
Poshek Fu (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
Leung Ping-Kwan (Lingnan University, Hong Kong)
Moderator: Joseph Wong (Asian Institute)

4:15-5:15pm
Horror Panel
Panelists:
Suzie Young (York University)
Bart Testa (University of Toronto)
Moderator: Jason Anderson (Film Critic)


May6
Sunday

Innis Town Hall
2 Sussex Avenue

2:30-3:30pm
Hong Kong Film Industry Panel
Panelists:
Peter Rist (Concordia University)
Raymond Chow (Journalist and Media Specialist)
Moderator: Colin Geddes (Ultra 8 Pictures)

Hong Kong Film Festival 2007

Innis Town Hall
Sat May 05 2007, 10:00am
Sat May 05 2007, 2:30pm
Sat May 05 2007, 6:30pm
Sat May 05 2007, 9:00pm
Sun May 06 2007, 1:00pm
Sun May 06 2007, 4:00pm

ROM Theatre
Fri May 04 2007, 7:30pm

Munk Centre
Fri May 04 2007, 10:00pm


Ticket Sales Begin:
Mon Apr 16 2007, 11:00am

Ticket Prices:
Single Film - $7.00
3-Screening Pass - $17.00
Festival Pass - $45.00
Opening Night Screening & Party - $15.00
Opening Night Party Only - $10.00

For More Information:
Visit Event Website
E-mail: N/A
Phone: (416) 978-8849
Fax: N/A

Venue information, including seating plans & maps.