Production
The turmoil that has overtaken Hong Kong since its return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997 has spawned a new generation of young, passionately committed activist filmmakers; they want to tell Hong Kong's story with Hong Kong voices. And the best indie documentary to have emerged so far from the HKSAR is this year's Yellowing, by Chan Tze Woon, a 29-year-old with degrees in policy studies and film production. Hong Kong's fraught, tense relationship with its mainland Chinese overseers came to a head with the Umbrella Movement of 2014. A crowd of protesters stormed Civic Square on September 27. The next day police shocked most residents of the HKSAR by attacking the growing crowds with volleys of tear gas, whereupon a wide cross section of Hong Kongers occupied the streets in several areas and stayed for almost 6 weeks. Chan took his camera on the streets for 67 days during these events.
Fong Ka-Man, has been leading a middle class lifestyle. One day, during a heavy rain in the dusk, bearing the fear of illness, she is unwillingly staying away from the rain inside the tunnel. She first encounters a weird tramp, and then a young farmer who is rushing to deliver his harvest. It’s about how the “normal” passes by the “abnormal”. What makes them “normal” and “abnormal” seems to be realistic, but maybe it is just a void. Fong Ka-Man is anxious to find an exit from the difficult circumstance, but accidentally she finds out that what she yearns for is the disappeared end of this city.
Ka, a common housewife, leaves her husband after big change in the family. Then she encounters Man, who has for years blamed her father Chow for bringing to light his relationship with his lover Tracy after the accidental death of Man’s mother. And so it seems that from departures stems relationships anew, but there are in fact little to be explained in the logic of cause-and-effect for existence, death, encounters, and love.
In his efforts to forget a five-year romance with a bewitching woman (Mei Ching Lam), Fai (Tony Leung Ka-Fai) ditches his career as a serious photojournalist and joins the ranks of the paparazzi. But when Fai's images of a glamorous socialite capture clues about her eventual murder, he works closely with an intern (Michelle Alicia Saram) to learn the truth about how the woman was killed. In the process, he must face ghosts from his painful past.
A group of documentary filmmakers began to shoot the civil social movement in Hong Kong, which became part of the city's common landscape. Spanning over two years, the filmmakers attempt to reveal the visible and invisible control behind. They trace a mysterious organization which is suspected to secretly control the weather which dampens the mood and suppresses the intention of the public to participate in social movements. On the surface, the question on inclement weather could be answered by climate changes around the world. The underlying sordid discussion, however, is really about intervention, pervasive suppression and control instead of any conspiracy theory.
Cheung Yuk Fan feels suffocated in Hong Kong after 2019. 2021 Summer, She resigns from her job as an arts administrator and rents a flat in a sub-divided unit in an industrial building. She is determined to hide herself in this small world and start her own online trading business, forgetting about the distractions of the outside world. But one day, the beautiful sound of piano playing next door suddenly leads her into a realm of fantasy and illusion.
Edward Leung was an average student before he unexpectedly finds himself at the focal point of two Legislative Council elections. Despite winning over 60,000 votes in the by-election, his ticket to LegCo is forfeited when the regime imposes extra measures in the nomination process. On the other hand, Edward finds his free days numbered as he faces rioting charges for taking part in the Mong Kok Protest.
Behind Mongkok’s Portland Street where French music plays in cute little artsy cafés, the back alley is a totally different world. Sister Kam washes dishes in the alley every night. She fights with the workers at the rubbish collection point and proudly boasts to the waiters how she could slaughter a pig on her own. She works till midnight and gets up at 5:30am, day after day. In the thousands of alleys in Hong Kong, stories that speak of life’ struggles wait to be told.
Wong's no-budget indie (dreamt up in a night, shot in a week) tells four distinct stories which intersect in the manner of Mystery Train. They range from character-based comedy (a young couple nervously venture into a 'love hotel' for the first time) to Grand Guignol melodrama (a Filipina maid seeks revenge on her two-timing lover - the actress being the director's mother's real-life maid).
A woman keeps telling people about how she felt when she made a long distance call to her boyfriend thirteen years ago. A man, waken by a mysterious midnight call, tries to recall certain things that happened thirteen years ago.
Cheung, a single mother living in an area with high crime rates, works hard to provide for her son while helping out her elderly neighbor.
Set in Hong Kong, Eya is a shy teen who takes writing as a way to escape alienation, bullying and loneliness. On the school fun day Eya remains silent in the interview, but she is not the only one who finds life is too hard to bear. Everything is changed that morning.
When the colors of the street seem fading, vitality of the city seems weakening, rhythm of people's life seems confusing...... There is still a bunch of young people, who are trying to confront the brutal facts of reality, to safeguard the kind of lifestyle they want to live. This is a fable from industrial building.
In late 2009, over twenty Hong Kong civic groups united as the "Anti-High-Speed Rail, Stop Funding" coalition, aiming to halt Legislative Council approval of the HKD 66.9 billion Express Rail Link amid deep social rifts. The "Post-80s Anti-High-Speed Rail Youth" group drew thousands of young people with their slogan “Defend Our Homeland, Protest with Joy,” leading to three funding suspensions that surprised the public. Media coverage was intense and innovative, featuring rare camera angles and lively online debate among journalists. This documentary explores how reporters shaped the movement, their emotional involvement, and the dynamic relationship between the media and activists during Hong Kong’s pivotal 2009–10 protests.
In the beginning of the year 1997, an ex-emigre man returns to Hong Kong, his city of birth and looks for a job. Unable to find one, he offers his services as an immigration consultant, and meets many people, including a lady with no past. A street Cleaner finds life with his pregnant wife and streets full of rubbish suffocating, and seeks new hope from the immigration consultant.
Centering on a girl who has learned she is pregnant, the film traces the intersecting paths of several young people across a night of the full moon.
Leaving In Sorrow is a gritty, realistic portrayal of Hong Kong in the aftermath of the Asian Financial Crisis. It is the first Hong Kong production filmed in the "Dogme 95" style, using hand-held cameras, natural lighting, and real locations. The film follows a disparate group of characters--including a pastor, a magazine editor, and a slacker from San Francisco--who find their lives suddenly turned upside down by events beyond their control.
1997 documentary, part of the Taiwan-produced series "Personal Memoir of Hong Kong", is both a self-portrait and a depiction of Hong Kong during the 40 years preceding the handover by the United Kingdom to China.
An overwhelming pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong (also described as the Occupy Movement or the Umbrella Revolution in the region) in 2014 has devastated many families in the city. A veteran journalist father, a policeman son and an activist daughter are living in a torn society of Hong Kong. The trios in the Suen family are caught off-guard by the teasing of Moerae, or the Goddess of Destiny. In philately, "tête-bêche", or head-to-tail in English, is used to referred to a pair of generic stamps which is inverted in relation to one another, either through a printing error or intentionally. The stamps are of special value only when they are unseparated. Metaphorically, "tête-bêche" can precisely reflected the portrayed family's tricky situation, that different role-plays or value judgments can lead to sparkling tension among family members, yet somehow the old saying of "blood is thicker than water" prevails.
Love is Elsewhere is a 2008 Hong Kong romantic drama film directed by Vincent Chiu.
