Festival will close with Creepy - announced at star-studded press conference

The Hong Kong International Film Festival Society (HKIFFS) revealed today the Opening Films of the 40th Hong Kong International Film Festival (HKIFF40), Chongqing Hot Pot, directed by China’s YANG Qing, and Trivisa, from the Hong Kong trio of Frank HUI, Vicky WONG and Jevons AU.  Chongqing Hot Pot will kick off HKIFF40 on 21 March 2016 with its World Premiere, while that same evening Trivisa will have its Asian Premiere.  The 15-day festival will close on 4 April 2016 with the Asian Premiere of Creepy, directed by Japanese filmmaker KUROSAWA Kiyoshi. The highly anticipated announcement was made at a press conference at The MOKO.

Chongqing Hot Pot is YANG Qing’s second feature film after One Night in Supermarket (2009), and continues to showcase his talents with plot twists and comic timing.  Chongqing Hot Pot is about three high school classmates who open a hot pot restaurant and find themselves in some wild and unexpected adventures after the business fails.  The cast includes CHEN Kun and BAI Baihe, two of China’s biggest stars.

Celebrated Hong Kong filmmaker Johnnie TO is the producer of Trivisa, passing on his cinematic style to three new talents.  Set before the handover of Hong Kong to China in 1997, the story is about three criminals planning to pull off a heist, with greed, hatred and bewilderment leading to their downfall. Each director follows one protagonist until their storylines ultimately intersect.

Closing Film Creepy is the latest thriller by KUROSAWA Kiyoshi.  The film stars leading man NISHIJIMA Hidetoshi as a former police detective who suspects that his neighbor may be involved in a six-year-old missing-person case.

With over 240 titles from 66 countries and regions, the lineup is as eclectic as ever, boasting 63 World, International and Asian Premieres.

Continuing with its previous successes in the Beautiful series, the festival will present Beautiful 2016, which is composed of four short films directed by China’s JIA Zhangke, Japan’s NAKATA Hideo, Taiwan’s Alec SU and Hong Kong’s Stanley KWAN.  The HKIFF will present the World Premiere of this omnibus production.

"In the Mood for Films – 25th Anniversary of Jet Tone Films" will present fifteen of the company’s productions during the festival, including two Jet Tone releases never before screened in Hong Kong, Eros: The Hand, a 60-minute version of WONG Kar Wai’s shorter film that was featured in the anthology Eros (2004), and The Grandmaster 3D, based on WONG’s North American version of his 2013 film, and a seminar with celebrated Hong Kong director WONG Kar Wai who founded Jet Tone Films in 1991.

Several world-renowned directors will visit Hong Kong for screenings of their films: Acclaimed Hungarian filmmaker Béla TARR, who will lead a master class following the screening of his film The Turin Horse (2011); Taiwan’s Master of Slow Cinema TSAI Ming-Liang (Afternoon, 2015); Japan’s prolific director SONO Sion (Shinjuku Swan, 2015; The Whispering Star, 2015; A Man’s Flower Road, 1986; and the short I am Sion Sono!!, 1984); Japan’s horror king KUROSAWA Kiyoshi (Creepy, 2016); and French-Canadian auteur Denis Côté (Boris Without Béatrice, 2016).

Awards Gala night will feature the Asian premiere of Crosscurrent by China’s YANG Chao, about a barge captain and failed poet who transports illegal cargo up the Yangtze River and encounters the same woman at each port.  Cinematographer Mark LEE Ping-Bin received the Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Contribution this month at the Berlin International Film Festival. The Gala Premiere will see Hong Kong populist director Herman YAU’s Nessun Dorma, a World Premiere.

South Korea takes the spotlight at this year’s festival, with four films in the Focus on Korean Cinema programme: KWON Oh-kwang’s debut feature, Collective Invention (2015), which perfectly combines bizarre humor with sharp social critique; the Asian Premiere of The Bacchus Lady (2016) by director E J-yong, about a 65-year-old woman who sells sexual favors to old men; IM Kwon-taek’s The Surrogate Woman (1987) starring KANG Soo-yeon, who captured the Best Actress award in Venice; and WOO Min-ho’s Inside Men (2015), a stylish thriller about corrupt politicians starring heartthrob LEE Byung-hun. The directors of each film will attend the screenings. Also, a seminar, “Training for a Global Industry” will bring together PARK Ki-yong, a leading filmmaker of the new Korean cinema, and Roger GARCIA, Executive Director of the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society, to discuss the challenges for film students in a rapidly changing and increasingly globalised industry.  The French Night highlights Jailbirds (2015) by Audrey ESTROUGO, which takes a hard look at the lives of women in prison, both their creation and the destruction society imposed upon them. French star Sophie MARCEAU will greet the audience in person.

The HKIFF continues to build its community outreach and audience development initiatives with “Community Screenings”.  The two free screenings are financially supported by the Hong Kong Arts Development Council, and each screening will be accompanied by a guest speaker. Also, the festival’s Film+ section has selected 21 screenings and reserved a number of tickets for each public screening for free distribution to secondary and tertiary students, with generous financial support from Create Hong Kong. All films will be followed by post-screening discussions. In addition, the HKIFF will conduct feature screenings with audio description.  This is an opportunity for visually impaired film-goers to have a complete experience when following a film through sounds and dialogue.

A full list of HKIFF40 selections is available at www.hkiff.org.hk. HKIFF40 will be held from 21 March to 4 April 2016.  Tickets for the public can be booked online at www.hkiff.org.hk and all URBTIX outlets from 26 February.