All filmmakers understand the challenge of making their first feature – but is it any easier to follow up a successful debut?
Susie Au
After making her directorial feature debut with Ming Ming in 2006, it was 18 years before Susie Au returned with follow-up She Fell To Earth, which premiered in the Tiger Competition at International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) in January.
Across the intervening years, Au has continued to work prolifically and is an award-winning music video and commercials director, whose diverse portfolio includes theatre, art installations and short films.
“I always engaged myself in non‑stop filming in different forms to explore narrative through images, which I believe have a magical power to evoke and provoke,” she says.
She Fell To Earth was conceived during the Covid pandemic when Au was locked down in Guangzhou, China. “The depressing climate around the world urged me to make a film about an emotional crisis from the point of view of an invisible being from outside the earth – an alien,” she explains, describing the film as a mix of wuxia, sci-fi and fantasy.
Filming took place in Foshan, near Guangzhou, with private funding and self-funding, featuring talent from a local dance academy alongside professional actors.
Au recalls how Ming Ming, which starred Zhou Xun and Daniel Wu, was shot on 35mm film. “Digital was on its way and it was foreseen that film language would be gradually shaping a different cinema world,” she adds. “It was an ambitious project when Hong Kong cinema was still highly commercial within its norm.”
Anselm Chan
Anselm Chan has made a trio of films within a few short years: romantic comedy Ready Or Knot in 2021 and its 2023 sequel Ready Or Rot, and The Last Dance, which wrapped recently.
“It’s a journey filled with challenges and blessings,” says Chan. “With my background as a comedy screenwriter, when the world was disrupted by the pandemic, I wanted to make a film that could bring laughter and let people forget their worries even for just a short while.”
Ready Or Knot, shot at the peak of the pandemic, was one of the local projects jointly backed by Emperor Motion Pictures (EMP) and One Cool Film Production to support the local industry during the Covid crisis, while fostering new talent.
Chan’s latest feature The Last Dance – a third collaboration with EMP – marks his transition into drama. Starring Dayo Wong and Michael Hui, the film looks at Hong Kong’s traditional funeral rituals, following a wedding planner-turned-funeral director and a Taoist priest.
“I was keen to write a story about this subject matter, to explore themes of life and death, as early as 10 years ago. But I wasn’t ready technically or mentally until my beloved grandmother passed away,” he says.
Chan is also the author of suspense novel Anchor.
Chan Tai Lee
After debuting in 2017 with Tomorrow Is Another Day, which earned a best new director nomination at the Hong Kong Film Awards, Chan Tai Lee was able to secure funding forChan was able to quickly secure funding for Fight For Tomorrow as the second installment of his Tomorrow Trilogy. He was then hired by Chinese Entertainment Tianjin to direct Fierce Cop, which went straight to streaming in China in 2022.
Chan, who is also a writer on the popular Ip Man franchise, feels fortunate that he has not encountered major funding difficulties as his projects are not large-scale. It also helps that he has a directorial contract with Mandarin Motion Pictures, which plans to release Fight For Tomorrow this year.
When Chan was finally able to film the the feature with actors Patrick Tam and Locker Lam in late 2022, it was at the tail end of the pandemic. Reflecting on how the Covid crisis inspired the story, Chan says: “I incorporated this real-life situation into the film about the father-son relationship, hoping the audience can reflect on one question – after facing difficulties, how should Hong Kong move forward into the future?”
Tomorrow Is Another Day and Fight For Tomorrow were both partially supported by Hong Kong’s Film Development Council (FDC).
Ricky Ko
It is notable that Ricky Ko has made three films despite the challenges of the past few years. He won critical acclaim with 2021 feature debut Time, which won the audience award at Vancouver International Film Festival and best actor prize at the Hong Kong Film Awards for 87-year-old star Patrick Tse.
Ko’s latest is Out Of The Shadow, starring Kay Tse as a mother who disguises her former identity as a decorated police officer, which premiered at Osaka Asian Film Festival earlier this month. It is produced by Local Production and One Cool Film Production, which also handles international sales.
Time travelled to international film festivals such as IFFR, Fantasia and Udine, “creating a buzz that gained the attention of investors”, says Ko. He then got to work on bigger budget production Drug Hunting in China. “It’s not always the case, though,” he says of scaling up. “Sometimes investors will say that since you can make it work with a small budget, they want to keep the budget low or even lower.”
Cop thriller Drug Hunting, starring Yang Zi and Wang Qianyuan, was shot before Out Of The Shadow but has not yet been released.
Ko previously worked as a screenwriter for TV before becoming an assistant director on blockbuster features including Project Gutenberg and The White Storm 2: Drug Lords.
Tam Wai Ching
Tam Wai Ching recently shot her second film Someone Like Me in 18 days. It tells the story of a woman with cerebral palsy who finds emotional and physical liberation through her interaction with a sex volunteer.
Starring Fish Liew and Carlos Chan, it counts Stanley Kwan and Catherine Kwan as producers, and is backed by Emperor Motion Pictures with the support of FDC’s Film Production Financing Scheme, which accounts for about 40% of the budget. Tam says she feels gratitude for the backers, who are willing to support an arthouse title despite ongoing challenges in the industry.
“Making the second film is hardly any easier than the first,” she explains. “I got to make my first film, In Your Dreams, after winning the FFFI competition, which allowed me to follow my own way.”
The winning projects selected for FDC’s First Feature Film Initiative (FFFI) are fully financed by the programme, enabling filmmakers to enjoy creative freedom. “But I have to consider commercial viability for my next film,” she adds. “Apart from artistic values, I have to tackle how I pitch a script to investors and convince them to fund it.”
Tam previously worked as a screenwriter on blockbuster films including The White Storm, Call For Heroes and Operation Mekong.
Norris Wong
Norris Wong won the best new director prize at the Hong Kong Film Awards in 2020 for her feature debut My Prince Edward, which was fully financed by FDC’s FFFI. When it came to her second film The Lyricist Wannabe, she chose not to go through any fundraising process.
“The subject of Cantonese lyric-writing is quite niche so we decided to self-finance and finish the production in a rather independent way,” says Wong. The $357,000 (hk$2.8m) feature was financed entirely by the filmmaker and her producer Wong Hoi.
“The cast worked at a lower fee, while the lyricists’ guest appearances, like Calvin Poon, Tim Lui, Saville Chan and Leung Pak Kin, were pro bono,” she adds.
The semi-autobiographical comedy drama takes a rare look at Canto-pop lyricists. Wong had aspired to be a lyricist since high school and worked as an exclusive lyricist at Warner Chappell Music before turning to filmmaking.
The Lyricist Wannabe opened on March 7 in Hong Kong, and is nominated in three categories including best actress for Chung Suet Ying at the upcoming Hong Kong Film Awards; she was also nominated at the Golden Horse Awards last November. Edko Films handles international sales.
Taiwan-based Wong is one of the directors of romance anthology series At The Moment, which was released globally on Netflix, and of anthology film Tales Of Taipei, which was the closing film at last year’s Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival.
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