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Martial arts veteran Sammo Hung will be presented with a lifetime achievement honor at the Asian Film Awards.

The ceremony is back as an in-person event after a two-year absence and has shifted back to Hong Kong after previously being held in Hong Kong, Macau and Busan. Hung will accept the award on Sunday at the Hong Kong Palace Museum.

Hung’s career as an actor, action choreographer, director and producer spans some 60 years.

His acting credits include action comedies “Dirty Tiger, Crazy Frog” and “Odd Couple,” paranormal horror comedies “Encounters of the Spooky Kind” and “The Dead and the Deadly,” comedy film series “Lucky Stars” and gangster action film “Shanghai, Shanghai.” In 1982, Hung won the best actor prize at the second Hong Kong Film Awards for his directorial effort “Carry on Pickpocket,” as well as best action choreography for “The Prodigal Son,” which he also directed and starred in.

Last Man Standing

Martial arts veteran Sammo Hung is to be presented with a lifetime achievement honor at the upcoming Asian Film Awards. The ceremony is back as an in-person event after a two-year absence and shifts back to Hong Kong after previously being held in Hong Kong, Macau and Busan. Hung is expected to accept the award on Sunday March 12 at the Hong Kong Palace Museum.

“I’m so happy and surprised that I can still win awards these days, especially an award that affirms my entire performing career,” said Hung in a forwarded statement. He has a career as actor, action choreographer, director and producer that stretches some 60 years.

His acting credits include action comedies “Dirty Tiger, Crazy Frog” and “Odd Couple” paranormal horror comedies “Encounters of the Spooky Kind” and “The Dead and the Deadly,” comedy film series “Lucky Stars” and gangster action film “Shanghai, Shanghai.”

In...

Asian Pop-Up Cinema today announces the spotlight Marquee films scheduled for the 15th Season, September 10 – November 6. The upcoming Fall festival will highlight the best animation from Asia with a diverse lineup of films from China, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Additionally announced is Jennifer Yu as the recipient of the festival’s Bright Star Award, who will come to Chicago specially for the award ceremony.

Season 15 kicks off with a pre-festival film event screening of Wei Jun-Zie’s documentary Kungfu Stuntmen, a behind-the-scenes look at Hong Kong action cinema and the contributions from martial artists. The film highlights the dedication of stuntmen, from prominent seniors to newcomers, throughout the profession’s 70-year history.. Tickets are General Admission (8/Adults with discounts for seniors & students); on sale at https://buytickets.at/Apuc.

Opening film, I Am What I Am is a lively action comedy telling the story of three...

Action star Sammo Hung will take the helm of the production of “Seven Little Fortunes,” a feature film re-telling Hung’s childhood story where he and a generation of Hong Kong action movie icons such as Jackie Chan were coached by their mentor, Peking opera master Yu Jim-yuen.

Co-produced by Yuen Biao Films Production, Beijing Renxing Film Media Culture and Quanton Times Pictures, Hung will be the chief director of the film penned by Raymond To (“I Have A Date With Spring”). Yuen Biao, who also trained under master Yu, will executive produce the project.

Starring Tony Leung Ka-fai the film is expected to have a production budget of RMB50-100 million ($7.7 -$15.5 million). Shooting is expected to start in March 2022. International sales have not yet been determined.

Known as a strict teacher, Yu was the master of the China Drama Academy, a Peking opera school in Hong Kong in...

Philip Yung’s Where The Wind Blows was one of two films expected to open the festival on April 1.

Hong Kong International Film Festival has cancelled screenings of Philip Yung’s Where The Wind Blows, one of its two opening films, citing technical reasons and a request from the film’s owner.

The big-budget crime thriller, starring Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Aaron Kwok, tells the true story of corrupt cops in Hong Kong in the 1960s when the territory was still under British rule.

The festival stated on social media: “Upon request from the film owner, the screenings of Where The Wind Blows,...

Asian sellers were presenting packed slates of new titles, but due to cinema closures, buyers are still cautious in many parts of the world.

Coming just a couple of weeks after the European Film Market, this year’s Filmart Online (March 15-18) was regarded by most buyers and sellers as an Asia-facing continuation of the more Europe-focused event.

Many Asian sellers came into the two markets with packed slates of new titles – production is returning to normal levels in most parts of the region – and reported a busy three-week period, with little downtime between the two events.

“Since EFM and Filmart were so close together,...

A North American rights deal for mainland Chinese fantasy action film ‘God of War II, was one of several film sales deals struck by Hong Kong’s Media Asia at the recent European Film Market and the ongoing FilMart.

Directed by Cai Cong, and starring Charles Lin, Liu Yuxi and David Wu, the film was completed in 2020. The buyer was WellGo USA, a regular distributor of Chinese and other Asian movies.

Media Asia also hatched a package of deals for films including “Septet,” “Fagara” and “The Calling of a Bus Driver” with Japanese distributor Musahino. It licensef “Septet” and “Tales From the Occult” to Singapore-based Clover Films for both Singapore and Malaysia.

“Septet: The Story of Hong Kong” is an anthology of seven short films by seven of the city’s most revered directors – Tsui Hark, Ann Hui, Sammo Hung, Patrick Tam, Yuen Woo-ping, Ringo Lam, and Johnnie To, who...

Frequent Johnnie To collaborator Dennis Law is directing the film, which stars Eddie Cheung and Dada Chan.

Hong Kong-based Entertaining Power is launching sales at Filmart Online on crime thriller A Murder Erased, written and directed by frequent Johnnie To collaborator Dennis Law.

Also produced by Law, the film started shooting in Hong Kong on February 21 and is targeting release at the end of the year. Eddie Cheung (Our Time Will Come), Dada Chan (The Secret Diary Of A Mom To Be) and Maggie Shiu (Port Of Call) head the cast.

Cheung plays a narcotics officer who is assigned to...

The Hong Kong International Film Festival, running April 1-12 this year as joint online/in-person event, will open with the premiere of two high-profile local features: Philip Yung’s Where the Wind Blows, starring Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Aaron Kwok, and Septet: The Story of Hong Kong, an omnibus film co-helmed by seven acclaimed Hong Kong directors including Sammo Hung, Ann Hui, Patrick Tam, Yuen Woo-ping, Johnnie To, Ringo Lam and Tsui Hark.

The lineup was unveiled Wednesday in a video presentation by the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society’s executive director Albert Lee. “For the first time in our history, we ...

The Hong Kong International Film Festival, running April 1-12 this year as joint online/in-person event, will open with the premiere of two high-profile local features: Philip Yung’s Where the Wind Blows, starring Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Aaron Kwok, and Septet: The Story of Hong Kong, an omnibus film co-helmed by seven acclaimed Hong Kong directors including Sammo Hung, Ann Hui, Patrick Tam, Yuen Woo-ping, Johnnie To, Ringo Lam and Tsui Hark.

The lineup was unveiled Wednesday in a video presentation by the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society’s executive director Albert Lee. “For the first time in our history, we ...

The Hong Kong International Film Festival has unveiled a familiar lineup of titles, talks and retrospectives for its 45th edition, which will return to its normal springtime slot after disruptions last year caused by the coronavirus.

“For the first time in our history, we will be presenting a hybrid festival consisting of both in-theatre and virtual screenings and events. While our belief in watching films communally on a big screen is unwavering, recent lockdowns and social distancing measures have accelerated our need to explore uncharted waters by embracing an additional online component,” said Hkiff Society executive director Albert Lee.

“The program is well balanced and covers a broad spectrum, from rarely-seen silent classics to contemporary filmmakers’ latest work. I am particularly thrilled to note that the festival will open with two significant Hong Kong films for the first time in recent years. So much for the talks of the demise of Hong Kong cinema!

Philip Yung’s Where The Wind Blows and Septet: The Story Of Hong Kong will open the festival.

The 45th Hong Kong International Film Festival has announced it will open with the world premiere of Philip Yung’s Where The Wind Blows and the gala premiere of omnibus Septet: The Story Of Hong Kong.

However, Where The Wind Blows is being announced as “Tbc” suggesting that it still needs to finalise mainland China censorship clearance. Aaron Kwok and Tony Leung Chiu-wai star in the big-budget crime drama, based on the true stories of two notoriously corrupt Hong Kong police officers...

Looking for VeneraThe first titles for the International Film Festival Rotterdam's hybrid multi-part 50th edition program have been revealed. Under new festival director Vanja Kaludjercic, the newly-organized and extended IFFR 2021 will feature a new program structure, with competition sections to be presented between 1 – 7 February. The festival will resume again between 2 – 6 June with Bright Future (the festival's existing section dedicated to emerging film talent) and what will be the festival's latest and largest section, Harbour. In February the festival will also celebrate the 75th anniversary of Amsterdam's Eye Filmmusuem, while in June IFFR's own 50th year will be celebrated with a special anniversary program. Tiger COMPETITIONAgate mousse (Selim Mourad)Bebia, à mon seul désir (Juja Dobrachkous)Bipolar (Queena Li)Black MedusaA Corsican Summer (Pascal Tagnati)The Edge of Daybreak (Taiki Sakpisit)Feast (Tim Leyendekker)Friends and Strangers (James Vaughan)Gritt (Itonje Søimer Guttormsen)Landscapes of Resistance (Marta Popivoda)Liborio (Nino Martínez Sosa...

2020 will go down in history for many things. The pandemic. The US elections. Rat-filled sinkholes. But 2020 will also go down in history as the year of Asian cinema: when Bong Joon-ho’s “Parasite” (2019) became the first non-English language film to win the coveted Academy Award for Best Picture; when Ann Hui was recognized with the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement Award at Venice Film Festival; when Mohammad Rasoulof’s Iranian drama “There Is No Evil” (2020) won Berlinale’s Golden Bear. And this is not even to mention the stellar achievements we’ve had at Asian Movie Pulse as well – including a new partnership with Mubi, a curated arthouse streaming service, and 1000 followers on Instagram. Now, we just want to take a step back to reflect on this year.

Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah — arguably the first major event to kick off the film festival circuit — gave us a...

Festival spearheaded by Cannes chief Thierry Frémaux set to run in Lyon October 10 to 18.

France’s Lumière Film Festival will host 23 titles from the Cannes Film Festival’s special 2020 Official Selection at its 12th edition running October 10 to 18 in Lyon.

The festival spearheaded by Cannes delegate general Thierry Frémaux, in his other role as head of the Institut Lumière, is pushing on with the 2020 edition in the face of rising Covid-19 restrictions in France following a surge in cases in the country.

The Lumière showcase represents just under half the 56 titles selected for Cannes’s special 2020 Official Selection that it...

Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSAbove: aKasha.We've been alerted by the programming team at the Toronto International Film Festival that Sudanese filmmaker Hajooj Kuka (aKasha), along with five other artists, has been sentenced to two months in prison.Speaking of TIFF, Chloé Zhao's Nomadland won the disrupted festival's People's Choice Award. Other notable winners this year include Michelle Latimer's Inconvenient Indian, Chaitanya Tamhane's The Disciple, and Dea Kulumbegashvili's Beginning.The great French actor Michael Lonsdale has died at the age of 89. Lonsdale's career range was incredible, including Jacques Rivette's epic Out 1, the James Bond film Moonraker, Marguerite Duras's India Song, and Spielberg's Munich. His physically towering presence was one of the great connective tissues across international cinema.Recommended VIEWINGSpike Lee has been having a big year, first with Da 5 Bloods...

"Over 7 decades of its history..." An early promo trailer has arrived for the omnibus feature film Septet: The Story of Hong Kong, which is premiering at the Festival Lumière this fall. Seven of Hong Kong's leading filmmakers have come together to each direct a short film set in Hong Kong during one decade from the 1940s to the 2000s. Yet another film looking back at the history of cinema, made by the filmmakers who shaped that history. It's an important time to celebrate Hong Kong as an independent nation and a unique place, and what better way than to highlight filmmakers and stories from there. The cast of Septet includes Simon Yam, Francis Ng, Lam Suet, Yuen Wah, Timmy Hung, Cheung Tat Ming, Lawrence Lau, Emotion Cheung, and Sire Ma. The seven filmmakers are: Sammo Hung, Ann Hui, Patrick Tam, Yuen Woo-ping, Johnnie To, Ringo Lam, and Tsui Hark. Get...

A feast for Hong Kong cinema lovers, Milkyway Image and Media Asia Distribution present an omnibus film by seven of Hong Kong’s most renowned directors: Sammo Hung, Ann Hui, Patrick Tam, Yuen Woo-ping, Johnnie To, Tsui Hark, and the late Ringo Lam. The project was initiated by Johnnie To, as a tribute to his home city and the final outcome “Septet: The Story of Hong Kong” premiered as official selection of the Cannes Film Festival 2020.

Synopsis

“Septet: The Story of Hong Kong’s” is a seven-part anthology, a collection of sketches exploring the history of Hong Kong one decade after the other, from the 1940s to present day.

Anthology films do not have the finest track record; they might not even have a good one. (New York’s Quad Cinema created an entire series centered on this problem.) Time and again, though, we see the names of however-many directors and actors we admire and think, well, there must be something to take in here—that much talent’s got to yield a worthwhile experience. Fool me twice, shame on me, but I’m made hopeful by the lineup for Septet: The Story of Hong Kong, a seven-part, seven-decade-spanning view of the city that’s produced, to my mind, the most consistently admirable oeuvre in world cinema.

And it is a great lineup: Sammo Hung, Ann Hui, Patrick Tam, Yuen Woo-ping, Johnnie To, Ringo Lam (offering his final work), and Tsui Hark. Notwithstanding the accompaniment by horrible music, this trailer hints at a panoply of styles and tones, though...

A documentary about the Wirecard financial scandal is in the works at Sky Studios. Gabriela Sperl is developing the project with producer Sffp, it will be directed by Benji and Jono Bergmann of Babka, who will also co-produce. The doc will chart the rise and fall of Wirecard, a financial payments firm once seen as the poster child for German tech innovation before it suddenly collapsed after the discovering of a €1.9Bn accounting black hole. Today, Wirecard’s CEO Markus Braun remains in custody with COO Jan Marsalek on the run, following the issuance of an international arrest warrant. In addition to the documentary, Sperl is also developing a fictional mini-series on the same topic for Sky Studios.

BBC Four has commissioned Brook Lapping, part of Zinc Media Group, to make a feature-length investigative documentary examining what became of the Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi’s huge wealth in the aftermath of the Arab Spring.

The 25th Busan International Film Festival to close with animation ‘Josee, The Tiger And The Fish’.

The 25th Busan International Film Festival is set to open with the world premiere of Septet: The Story Of Hong Kong, directed by Sammo Hung, Ann Hui, Patrick Tam, Yuen Wo Ping, Johnnie To, Ringo Lam and Tsui Hark.

The omnibus film, which received a Cannes 2020 label, was initiated by To as a tribute to his home city and shot on film in honour of the golden age of Hong Kong cinema, during which all seven of the directors first emerged. The segment directed...

The 25th edition of the Busan International Film Festival will shrink by a third and be presented in a hybrid in-person and offline format, due to the challenges posed by the coronavirus.

Running with newly announced dates of Oct. 21-30, the festival will present foreign titles as both opening and closing films.

It will open with “Septet: The Story of Hong Kong,” an omnibus film by filmmakers from Hong Kong: Sammo Hung, Ann Hui, Patrick Tam, Yuen Wo Ping, Johnnie To, Ringo Lam, and Hark Tsui, which was previously official selection of the Cannes Film Festival. The festival will close with animated Japanese film “Josee, the Tiger and the Fish,” directed by Tamaru Kotaro.

The reduced format means that most events involving human contact have been canceled. These include the opening and closing ceremonies, red carpet, receptions, and parties. On-stage greetings, the ‘Open Talk’ fan meetings and other guest meetings...

Arguably, the 72nd edition of Cannes was one of the most historic editions in history for Asian cinema. After winning the Palme d’Or, Parasite and Bong Joon-ho quickly became a household names around the world. Even though we won’t quite get the drama of an in-person film festival this year (thanks to Covid-19), the 73rd edition of Cannes still released its full roster of would-be premieres. We’ve listed here the Asian films that did make 2020’s Official Selection.

Some overview: Asian films make up around 24% of the 55 films selected, most of which hail from East and Central Asia. Of the selection, we have some familiar names along with some newcomers, including a CGI Ghibli film, a sequel to zombie-thriller “Train to Busan,” and an omnibus love letter to Hong Kong by some of its most famous directors. See the full list below!

concept art for “Peninsula,” the...

Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSWe're saddened to hear that Anna Karina, one of the defining figures of the French New Wave, has died. Though primarily remembered as the muse of Jean-Luc Godard, Karina was a remarkable actor, writer, and filmmaker in her own right. Justin Chang of the L.A. Times recalls her toughness and charm as seen throughout her expansive career. Courtesy of Josh Martin, the Chinese Film Bureau has shared a promising updated on the long gestating anthology film Seven-Person Band (previously titled Eight & a Half). The omnibus film is produced by Johnnie To, and features "some of Hong Kong's most renowned directors," including the late Ringo Lam. Alex Ross Perry is set to adapt Stephen King's 1989 novel The Dark Half, which follows an author whose literary alter ego comes to life with grisly intentions.