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Chinese romantic crime drama “Better Days” directed by Hong Kong’s Derek Tsang, scooped eight awards at this year’s Hong Kong Film Awards, including best film, best director, best screenplay and best actress. Critically acclaimed elderly gay drama “Suk Suk” took the best actor and best supporting actress awards, organizers announced on Wednesday afternoon.

Winners, however, were unable to give acceptance speeches on stage as the awards ceremony was cancelled due to the coronavirus epidemic. The results were announced instead via a 25-minute live streaming event hosted by awards chairman Derek Yee.

Dressed in black tie, Yee appeared to be sitting in a dimly lit VIP cinema among the awards statuettes, yet to be presented to the recipients. He said despite the cancellation of the star-studded awards ceremony, organizers kept the polling going and received 1,675 votes from industry practitioners, about 57% of registered voters.

“Better Days” was yanked by mainland...

The full list of nominations for the 39th Hong Kong Film Awards has been revealed. However, the dates are still unknown; the mid-April event in fact, will be probably postponed due to the Covid-19 (a.k.a. coronavirus). So for now let’s just have a look at the nominees.

This year’s edition sees Derek Tsang Kwok-Cheung’s “Better Days” leading the competition with an amazing 12 nominations, followed at close range by Heiward Mak’s “Fagara” with 11 nominations and Wong Hing-Fan’s “I’m Livin’ It” with 10. Moreover, Wilson Yip’s “Ip Man 4: The Finale” bagged 9 nominations, including Best Director and Best Action Choreography.

Read the full list of nominations below:

Better Days by Derek Tsang

Best Film

Better Days by Derek Tsang

Suk Suk by Ray Yeung

Fagara by Heiward Mak

I’m Livin’ It by Wong Hing-fan

The New King Of Comedy by Stephen Chow

Best...

Derek Tsang’s ’Better Days’ heads the awards race with 12 nods, followed by ‘Fagara’ (11) and ’I’m Livin’ It’ (10).

The Hong Kong Film Awards has announced the nominations for its 39th edition, with Derek Tsang’s Better Days leading the pack, but due to the coronavirus outbreak is considering postponing the ceremony or switching to a different format.

Usually scheduled for mid-April, this year’s awards are likely to take place the following month, ditch the red carpet and change venue away from the Hong Kong Cultural Centre. Organisers say nothing has been decided at this point but the intention...

Osaka Asian Film Festival is held yearly under the theme of “From Osaka to All of Asia!” We are pleased to announce the line-up of the 15th edition of Oaff.

The number of selected films is 64 in total, the highest number ever for the festival, and they include 14 World Premieres, 12 International Premieres, and 3 Asian Premieres. Films from 23 countries and regions, including China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Cambodia, India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Kazakhstan, Poland, France, Germany, Denmark, Portugal, Italy, the USA, Mexico and Japan, will be screened.

Opening Film

The Garden of Evening Mists

by Tom Shu-yu Lin (Malaysia) Japan Premiere

Closing Film

Kamata Prelude

by Nakagawa Ryutaro, Akiyama Mayu, Yasukawa Yuka, Watanabe Hirobumi (Japan) World Premiere

Competition

This section will present 15 films chosen from films completed on or after 1st October 2018 and unreleased in Japan. The international jurors will choose the winners of the Grand...

Heiward Mak studied Creative Media at the City University of Hong Kong. She entered the movie industry early, and at the age of 24, she directed her debut film “High Noon” (2008) portraying the new generation of Hong Kong youths. With highly successful “Mad World” (2016) she debuted as a producer, sharing her wealth of experience with a debuting director. She was shooting short films, full features as well as many commercials and music videos. In addition, she authored scripts.

On the occasion of “Fagara”, her sixth feature movie, screening at the Five Flavours Asian Film Festival, we talk to her about the importance of understanding your crew, generational conflicts, family ties, her cooperation with Ann Hui, and how the recent events in Hong Kong are influencing families. Focused, attentive and analytical, she provides an in-depth look at her characters.

You are a director, writer, editor, as well as a producer. How those roles differ for you?...

International premiere of “Flowers of Evil”, Hong Kong “Fagara” as the opening film, and Japanese “Bone Born Bone” at the closure of Five Flavours 13th edition!

This year, as always, the festival will provide an opportunity to discover original voices of young and recognized directors from South Korea, Bhutan, Thailand or Vietnam. We will explore the charms and ills of Japanese peripheries: its harbour cities, outskirts and marginal territories. We will watch films highly appreciated by festival juries. Special consideration will be given to Hong Kong which today is experiencing a serious political crisis: our guest will be Fruit Chan, a star of its independent cinema. However, the Programme has also a place for juicy genre cinema: horror, action, perverse comedies are an ideal remedy for the November weather in Warsaw.

Here is the Programme in its strands:

New Asian Cinema

Like every year the competition section presents challenging, daring films,...

New films by Anthony Chen, Heiward Mak and Kongdej Jaturanrasmee in New Asian Cinema competition. You are invited to the presentation of the full programme on 24 October!

Heartwarming “Fagara”, bitter-sweet “To Live to Sing”, subtle “Wet Season” and lyrical “Where We Belong” together with challenging “Heavy Craving” complete the list of films to be presented in the New Asian Cinema competition. As every year, the Five Flavours viewers will receive a perfect mixture of sincere emotions, affecting topics and interesting formal choices – so that each screening became an unforgettable experience.

The main award will be granted by People’s Jury – a group of amateurs and semi-professionals whose sincere love of cinema and Asia combined with advanced journalistic skills allow them to make competent assessment of the competition films and choose the winner of the Festival.

Presentation of the programme

On 24 October at 4.15 p.m. viewers and journalists are invited to...

This weekend will likely see Warner Bros. and New Line's It: Chapter Two enjoy a second weekend at #1, but at the same time Stx is looking for much needed success from their newest release, Hustlers. The Jennifer Lopez-led crime feature is looking to not only deliver a live-action record opening for the star, but also a record opening for the studio should it top the $23.8 million opening for Bad Moms back in 2016. Meanwhile, WB's The Goldfinch is looking as if it will fall short of a double digit debut following disappointing reviews coming out of the Toronto Film Festival. Looking to finish atop the weekend box office for a second straight weekend is Warner Bros. and New Line's It: Chapter Two. The sequel to the 2017 smash hit delivered a strong, $91 million debut last weekend and should experience a drop around -59% or so this weekend, which is...