The Hong Kong International Film Festival Society (HKIFFS) has announced 28 in-development projects for the 21st Hong Kong-Asia Film Financing Forum (HAF), which is set to return as an in-person event for the first time since 2019.
The projects span horror, fantasy, romance, family drama and animation, and include seven from Hong Kong, eight from HAF Film Lab and 14 directorial debuts. There are also projects from acclaimed filmmakers and producers such as Arsalan Amiri, Anthony Chen, Fruit Chan, Jakrawal Nilthamrong, Lin Yu-Hsien, Nai An, Nader Saeivar, Teddy Robin and Tian Zhuangzhuang.
Scroll down for full list of HAF 21 projects
HAF is set to run from March 13-15 alongside the 27th Hong Kong Film and TV Market (Filmart) at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre, the same venue in pre-Covid years. Both events have taken place online for the previous three editions due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The eight projects that had previously passed through the HAF Film Lab, which offers training and consultation support to new and emerging Chinese-language filmmakers, will now move into the development stages within HAF’s ecosystem.
They include three script service award winners: Tang Peiyan’s A Better Tomorrow, a coming-of-age drama produced by Anthony Chen (Ilo Ilo); Frankie Lee’s Kapok, a drama about a woman burdened by work and family duties who returns to her hometown to find solace, to be produced by Fruit Chan (Three Husbands); and The Only Way Out, directed by Yeung Leung-chuen and produced by Jun Li (Drifting), about five lost souls in search of a way out.
The other HAF Film Lab projects are Hugo In The Pigpen by Shen Sheng-Ting and Shih Jing-Ting, a Taiwan-US co-production about a boy who raises a pig with a human body; Guan Tian’s The Poison Cat, produced by Yang Chao (Crosscurrent), about an enslaved woman whose fate entwines with an evil spirit; Fan Ka-chun’s Stair-away, produced by Teddy Robin (The First Girl I Loved), about a courier, a father searching for his lost son, and the missing head of a dead girl; and The Walking Bird by Zhang Hanyi - whose Life After Life was HKIFF Firebird Award winner in 2016 - about two siblings on a bird hunting adventure.
Marco Mueller-produced drama
The selection also includes two projects based on the filmmakers’ personal experiences and a further two adapted from award-winning novels. In The Fruit, produced by Marco Mueller, former festival director of Venice, Rome, Locarno and Pingyao, director Li Dongmei (whose Mama won the Ingmar Bergman international debut award at the Goteborg Film Festival in 2021) tracks the joy and sadness of a woman through pregnancy and miscarriage, while The Last Haven, produced by Zhang Lu (Yanagawa) for producer-turned-director Zhang Jun, follows a woman moving back in with her parents after a divorce, only to open old wounds.
Based on a novel by the late Lee Wei-Jing, The Mermaid’s Tale by Norris Wong (who was named best new director at the 2020 Hong Kong Film Awards for My Prince Edward) is about a woman searching for a perfect ballroom dancing partner, while Zhao Jin’s directorial debut, Non-Fiction Stories, produced by Nai An (The Shadow Play) and adapted from Wang Zhanhei’s novel, examines the hardship of the young working class through the life of a delivery rider.
Several projects revolve around the themes of love and scams. A Divorce by Jevons Au (Trivisa) explores how a fake divorce turns real when love and trust disappear; Family Of Crooks by Lai Kuo-An (A Fish Out Of Water) is about a street opera troupe family feigning madness in an insurance scam; and The Marriage Drive by Lawrence Kan, produced by industry veteran Cora Yim, tells the story of a couple’s marriage spanning over a decade.
Continuing the love theme, Zhang Yuxuan’s China-Thailand-France co-production, Till Forgetfulness Do Us Part, follows two estranged lovers who travel to Thailand to start over, and China’s Fifth Generation heavyweight Tian Zhuangzhuang (The Horse Thief) joins He Bin (The Crossing) in producing new director Phakpa’s Dark Eyes, a tale of first love between a Buddhist monk and a young blind girl that transcends beliefs.
Non-Chinese language projects
Resilient elderly women and pre-teens take centre stage in several non-Chinese language projects. In White Snow by Praveen Morchhale (whose Walking With The Wind was a winner at India’s National Film Awards in 2018), an old woman embarks on an arduous journey to remote villages to show her imprisoned son’s banned film, while in The Witness by Nader Saeivar (a co-writer of Jafar Panahi’s 3 Faces and director of No End, which premiered at Busan in October), an Iranian widow refuses to succumb to political pressure and exposes everything she knows about a murder.
Bhunte by Bikas Neupane is about a poor village boy in Nepal who dreams of getting a football, while Nagahama (working title) by Mio Taniguchi (whose Hiko And Vega won the grand prize at Aichi International Women’s Film Festival) tracks the friendship of a half-Japanese boy and a boyish Japanese girl leading up to the traditional Nagahama Hikiyama Festival.
Two queer tales from Southeast Asia are also in the mix. Skin Coat, the only animated feature project in the line-up, is produced by Singapore’s Anthony Chen for Tan Wei Keong, depicting a man donning a woman’s skin coat to enter his male lover’s village to meet his parents, while Rhizome, a Thailand-Laos-France co-production by Jakrawal Nilthamrong (whose Anatomy Of Time was Tokyo FILMeX’s grand prize winner), focuses on a Hmong woman who returns to Laos to help clear land mines and develops intimate feelings for a Laotian volunteer.
This year, HAF received 244 submissions from 38 countries and regions for its in-development projects section. A separate section of work-in-progress projects will be announced after Chinese New Year.
HAF21 in-development projects
* First narrative feature projects
^ Winner of script consultation service awards at HAF Film Lab in 2022
Ah Ji (HK) *
Dir. Leo ZHU
Pro. HO Ting-wai
Prodco. Booooom
A Better Tomorrow (China) ^*
Dir. TANG Peiyan
Pros. Anthony CHEN, XIE Meng
Prodco. Canopy Pictures Shanghai
Bhunte (Nepal) *
Dir. Bikas NEUPANE
Pro. Govinda Prasad KHANAL
Prodco. Hamrobox Entertainment
A Collapse Of Time (China) *
Dir. FENG Yi
Pro. LIU Jike
Prodco. Slumber Mountain Pictures
Dark Eyes (China) *
Dir. Phakpa
Pros. TIAN Zhuangzhuang, HE Bin
Prodco. General Dream Studio
A Divorce (UK-HK-Can)
Dir. Jevons AU
Pros. Catherine WONG, Isis TSO
Prodcos. Movie Guys Canada Inc., 109G Studio
Family Of Crooks (Tai)
Dir. LAI Kuo-An
Pro. Juno TENG
Prodco. Dancing Whale Production Co.
Fly Me To The Mars (China) *
Dir. ZHAO Dadi
Pro. Jane XIE
Prodco. Dirty Monkey Studio
The Fruit (China)
Dir. LI Dongmei
Pros. Marco Mueller, QI Ai
Prodco. Leopard Film Culture and Arts Co.
Hugo In The Pigpen (Tai-US) *
Directors: SHEN Sheng-Ting, SHIH Jing-Ting
Pros. LAI Zhen-Lin, LIANG Mei-Jou, SHEN Sheng-Ting
Prodco. Dot Connect Studio
Janava (Iran)
Dir. Arsalan AMIRI
Pros. Ruth Yoshie LINTON, Ida PANAHANDEH
Prodcos. Evar Film Studio, Kingyo Films
Kapok (HK) ^*
Dir. Frankie LEE
Pro. Fruit CHAN
Prodco. Frankie Lap Production
The Last Haven (China)
Dir. ZHANG Jun
Pros. ZHANG Lu, XU Jiahan
Prodco. Zhang Jun Studio
The Marriage Drive (HK)
Dir. Lawrence KAN
Pro. Cora YIM
Prodco. Plan C Studio
The Mermaid’s Tale (Tai-HK)
Dir. Norris WONG
Pros. Gene YAO, Albert YAO
Prodco. MaplessLab Co.
Nagahama (working title) (Jap)
Dir. TANIGUCHI Mio
Pro. KATAHARA Tomoko
Prodco. Kolmio Film
Non-Fiction Stories (China) *
Dir. ZHAO Jin
Pros. NAI An, TONG Wenqun, Dia WANG Yunzhi
Production Companies: Midnight Blur Films, Sputnik Entertainment, TMZ Media
The Only Way Out (HK) ^*
Dir. YEUNG Leung-chuen
Pro. Jun LI
Prodco. Goodnight Production
The Poison Cat (China) *
Dir. GUAN Tian
Pros. YANG Chao, Vivian BAO, DING Ningyuan
Prodco. Beijing Guanyu Film
Racing Storm (Tai)
Dir. LIN Yu-Hsien
Pro. Roger HUANG, Lorraine HO
Prodcos. Jumpboys Film Ltd., Whisper Entertainment
Rhizome (Thai-Laos-Fr)
Dir. Jakrawal NILTHAMRONG
Pros. Chatchai CHAIYON, Yohann CORNU
Prodco. Mit Out Sound Films
Skin Coat (Sing) *
Dir. TAN Wei Keong
Pros. Anthony CHEN, TEOH Yi Peng
Prodco. Giraffe Pictures
Stair-away (HK) *
Dir. FAN Ka-chun
Pro. Teddy Robin
Prodco. Loudprovision
Tender is the Night (China)
Dir. YUAN Qing
Pros. JI Wei, Dia WANG Yunzhi, ZHAO Jin
Prodco. Sputnik Entertainment
Till Forgetfulness Do Us Part (China-Thai-Fr) *
Dir. ZHANG Yuxuan
Pros. ZHANG Fan, QIU Sheng, Clément PELLETIER
Prodco. Beijing Bifun Culture Media
The Walking Bird (China)
Dir. ZHANG Hanyi
Pro. MA Xiaotian
Prodco. Rare Pictures
White Snow (India)
Dir. Praveen MORCHHALE
Pros. Praveen MORCHHALE, Suneel SAJNANI
Prodco. Barefoot Pictures
The Witness (Iran)
Dir. Nader SAEIVAR
Pro. Said Nur AKKUS
Prodco. ArtHood Films
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