EXCLUSIVE: Hong Kong’s One Cool Pictures has acquired sales rights to Dead End, an upcoming suspense drama produced by Twilight Of The Warriors director Soi Cheang that is set to world premiere in Busan’s Vision-Asia competition.
The Hong Kong film marks the feature directorial debut of Isabella Lam Lok-hin and revolves around a computer programmer whose quiet family life is upended when a teenager shows up who claims to be his half-brother and forces him to confront long-buried memories of his father’s tragic death.
The cast is led by Lokman Yeung from boy band Mirror who toplined Cheang’s 2023 Berlinale title Mad Fate, Hedwig Tam from Montages Of A Modern Motherhood and veteran Maggie Shiu.
The project is supported by Hong Kong’s Film Development Fund through the First Feature Film Initiative, which is designed to facilitate emerging talents to make their first features.
”Dead End explores the wounds that remain beneath the surface of everyday life and the lasting impact of trauma, memory and loss,” said director-writer Lam. “These emotions are not only individual experiences, but as part of a collective trauma shared by a city searching for a way forward.”
Lam previously worked with Cheang on the post-production of his films such as SPL 2 and Twilight Of The Warriors: Walled In, the blockbuster action feature that played at Cannes in 2024 and went on to become that year’s second biggest film at the Hong Kong box office.
Lam’s 2012 short On Sleepless Roads, The Sleepless Goes won the best creativity award at Hong Kong’s Fresh Wave International Short Film Festival and received a jury recommendation at the Hong Kong Independent Short Film and Video Awards (ifva).
Dead End is one of 11 titles selected for the Vision-Asia section of the 31st Busan International Film Festival, which is set to run October 6-15. The section is dedicated to supporting independent cinema, fresh voices and bold perspectives from across Asia, and awards numerous prizes.
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