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Focus Hong Kong is back this July with Making Waves – Navigators of Hong Kong Cinema, a touring film programme marking the 25th anniversary of the Handover presented in partnership with Create Hong Kong. Opening with the highly anticipated Anita Mui biopic Anita, the festival will close with the legendary actress’ final screen appearance in the landmark 2004 Ann Hui drama, July Rhapsody.
Friday 8 July, 7pm: Opening Gala Anita (Soho Hotel)
Longman Leung’s highly anticipated biopic of iconic Cantopop superstar and revered Hong Kong actress Anita Mui who sadly passed away after battling cervical cancer at the young age 40 in 2003.
Saturday 9 July
12:00: Comrades, Almost a Love Story + Peter Chan holo-presence (Soho Hotel)
Maggie Cheung and Leon Lai star as a pair of star-crossed Mainlanders seeking new futures in Hong Kong. While he, naive and earnest, hopes to make enough money to marry his hometown girlfriend, she, more cynical, seeks security in consumerism but the pair are finally brought together by the music of Teresa Teng.
16:30: The First Girl I Loved (Garden Cinema)
A young woman begins to re-evaluate her teenage romance when her first love asks her to be maid of honour at her wedding in Yeung Chiu-hoi & Candy Ng Wing-shan’s youth nostalgia romance. Review.
19:00: Tales From the Occult (Garden Cinema)
Three-part horror anthology featuring contributions from Fruit Chan, Fung Chih Chiang, and Wesley Hoi Ip Sang exploring the hidden horrors of the contemporary Hong Kong society.
Sunday 10 July
12:30: Hand Rolled Cigarette (Garden Cinema)
Gordon Lam stars as a former British soldier unable to adjust to the post-handover society and trapped in a triad-adjacent existence while bonding with a South Asian migrant on the run from gangsters from whom his cousin stole a large amount of drugs. Review.
15:30 : Breakout Brothers (Garden Cinema)
A cheerful triad who wants to give his mother a kidney transplant, a falsely convicted architect, and a veteran inmate who wants to see his daughter get married decide to break out of prison but discover that it’s friendship that sets them free in Mak Ho-Pong’s cartoonish crime caper. Review.
18:00: Closing Gala July Rhapsody (Garden Cinema)
Landmark 2004 drama from Ann Hui featuring Anita Mui in her final screen role as the wife of a schoolteacher (Jackie Cheung) whose marriage is destabilised when an old lover returns from abroad and her husband is tempted by the attentions of a precocious student.
Making Waves – Navigators of Hong Kong Cinema runs in London 8 to 10 July at Soho Hotel and the Garden Cinema. The programme will also be touring to cities around the world including: Udine, Shanghai, Bali, Bangkok, Singapore, Sydney, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Tokyo, Warsaw, Prague, Dubai, and Hong Kong later in the year with full details to be available via the Making Waves website in due course. Tickets are already on sale via Focus Hong Kong and you can keep up to date with all the latest news via Focus Hong Kong’s official website, Facebook Page, Twitter account, and Instagram channel.
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