EMP’S 2018 LINE-UP
2018-03-19
Ever since its founding in 2000, Emperor Motion Pictures has remained devoted to producing significant films that showcase directors’ creativity, resulting in numerous accolades and awards including Best Picture, Director, Actor, and Actress, and a variety of trailblazing works spanning multiple genres. Looking forward in 2018, EMP’s slate of brilliant new Chinese-language productions includes:
1. INTEGRITY
The celebrated creative team of director and scriptwriter Alan Mak with producer Felix Chong and Ronald Wong -- the forces behind Infernal Affairs and Overheard -- overdo themselves in affairs simultaneously infernal and infamous in this tale of a remarkable ICAC case that unites movie royalty Sean Lau, Nick Cheung and Karena Lam, an instant classic of the genre that manages to be both thrilling and heart-stirring.
2. THE LADY IMPROPER
Hong Kong Film Award winner for Best New Director Tsang Tsui Shan and producer Polly Yeung kindle sparks of passion with the pairing of Hong Kong entertainment goddess Charlene Choi and award-winning Taiwan star Wu Kang-jen. Charlene plays Ann, a repressed young lady whose psychological inability to consummate her marriage leads to divorce. But Ann’s drab demeanor begins to undergo seismic change after a life-changing encounter with a free-spirited chef revitalizes her in ways previously unimaginable.
3. 77HEARTBURNS
The critical and box office success of 77 Heartbreaks has led to the reuniting of cast and crew for this sequel, with the key term “heart breaks” changed to “heart burns”. This time the couple enters the graveyard of love -- marriage. The challenge facing Adam (Pakho Chau) is whether his love is enough for Eva (Charlene Choi) to achieve a happy ending!
4. WHEN SUN MEETS MOON
Following Benny Lau’s success with his directorial debut Wong Ka Yan, his second feature gives actress Kathy Yuen, known for her fresh-faced beauty, her first chance in a lead role. Joining her is Daichi Harashima, former child star of Lost in Time, and the two create a finely etched portrait of first love that also invokes our collective memories of the 1990s, an image further enhanced by the presence of such icons as Aimee Chan, Danny Summer, Mark Lui, Lawrence Cheng, Maggie Shiu.
5. FATAL VISIT
Based on the play of the same name by Candace Chong and winner of four prizes at the 19th Hong Kong Drama Awards, the drama had three stage runs to great popular acclaim. The film adaptation was written by Philip Yung, whose Port of Call won the Kong Film Award for Best Script. Directed by Calvin Poon and starring Sammi Cheng, Tong Dawei, and Charlene Choi, the movie provides the stellar trio with an exciting opportunity to display their acting chops in a harrowing tale of a love triangle gone wrong.
6. COLD DETECTIVE
Director Wai Kar Fai again teams up with Sean Lau along with Charlene Choi and Raymond Lam for this “cop and robber” thriller with a difference. The story centers around a murderer who dubs himself “Super Sleuth” and challenges the police force’s own super sleuth. They engage in a battle of wits akin to a Hong Kong-style Seven, when at the critical moment the police’s “cold detective” discovers the assassin’s next target and patiently awaits his arrival…..
7. CROSSFIRE
Acclaimed action director Benny Chan takes the post of co-producer alongside international star and fellow co-producer Donnie Yen in this crime thriller with Yen playing former high-ranking Hong Kong police inspector Eugene Lai. His wife is on a clandestine mission overseas when Lai receives news her squad was attacked by unidentified assailants leaving all dead except for his spouse, whose fate is unknown. Lai hurries to save her but is pursued by the double forces of local police and mafia intent on killing him. Determined to get to the bottom of the dark mysteries surrounding the case, Lai accidentally finds out the mastermind is an enigmatic drug lord known as the Poet. Lai rallies his comrades-in-arms to engage in a “Scorch the Poet” campaign that in turn reveals the startling secrets concealed behind the scenes.
8. LONELY EIGHTEEN
Directed by Mad World producer Sung Kee Chiu and starring Irene Wan, this is the tale of Elaine, a lass from the Hong Kong shanty town of Rennie’s Mill. Her formative years were spent in an environment devoid of family warmth, leaving Elaine determined to grow up and form a family of her own. Fate led her to the entertainment world but it was a rocky road strewn with betrayal, coercion, drug addiction and rape, setting Elaine on a suicidal path till her destructive spiral was halted by a life-affirming epiphany.
