Peers and Seniors
The Chinese title of Wong Jing’s book is Young Wong Jing Enters the Jianghu. That last word literally translates to Rivers and Lakes, but it can mean different things. It can mean the world of Triads or it can mean the fictional world whether it be the Wuxia genre or the entertainment industry. The book is a compendium of autobiographical articles that were published in Ming Pao Weekly. The first series of articles was titled under the heading of Young Wong Jing while the second series was titled under the heading of Wong Jing’s Jianghu. Altogether, there were sixty articles. The book differs in that Wong Jing went into more detail about certain things. He had to or people would have complained that the book was a pointless purchase. As a maker of gambling films, Jing understands the importance of having an ace card.
I have been writing a book about Wong Jing that is heavily reliant on his book. I’ve put my own spin on things because, over the years, I’ve compiled so much info on him that even he hadn’t touched on in his book. Also, I realized that if he became an English language film-maker and decided to write an English version of his book, I would need to make sure that my book has enough distinguishing features in order to justify people purchasing it. If my book gets accepted by a publisher who decides to send me on a virtual tour where I’m interviewed on Chinese TV or websites then my book would be considered worthwhile enough for people in China to buy (not just the Mainland but Taiwan, Macau and Hong Kong). I think that even Wong Jing would be impressed.
Originally, the book was going to have an 80k word-count but there’s only so much that I can take out before people start to question the substance. I’ve excised so much material that you could combine the word-counts of my out-takes articles (on WordPress, Substack and Medium) to form a whole book. In today’s world, people are more likely to judge a book by the number of pages than number of words (which is really more of an industry concern than a consumer’s one). My word-count is currently 88,888 because Wong Jing has an obsession with the number eight. His book cost HK$88, and it was published in the eighth month of 2011. Here are things that I’ve removed pertaining to what Wong Jing said about his peers and seniors…
Run Run Shaw: I didn’t have many opportunities to meet him. The longest time I spent with him was when I attended the Asia Pacific Film Festival in Tokyo with him and Mona Fong one year. He was already over 70 years old and very talkative, but not as ordinary as Singaporeans. Like everyone else, he likes to speak English, but he speaks less Ningbo and Shanghainese. He will even tell dirty jokes to boys in English. I admire his “forbearance” in business. In the 1980s, he resolutely gave up his film career and switched to TVB. At that time, there were rumors that Mr. Shaw had been defeated by Golden Harvest’s Raymond Chow and that Shaw’s empire collapsed. But today, Shaw Brothers is still the leader, and TVB is also the victorious general. For many years, Mr. Shaw has not defended himself even half a sentence. All attack are defeated with facts. The film library of Shaw’s 800 films was determined not to be sold for many years, and was finally sold to Celestial Entertainment at a high price. However, it was digitally restored, leaving a precious film library for Hong Kong films. These business decisions all show that the wisdom of the old man is overwhelming. I think he has learned a lot and is prosperous!
Li Han-Hsiang: When Ming Pao Weekly wanted a sample of my manuscript, I hoped that the column style would be influenced by his Thirty Years of Speaking Again. Well known as a Shaw Brothers director, Li’s film achievements are highly respected by me personally. It is a glory for myself to be compared with him. He has first-class attainments in photography, art, music, drama tension control and screenwriting in general. By the time that I joined Shaw Brothers in the early 1980s, he creative power was exhausted and he had become disengaged. His works had lost their luster. He jumped ship from the Shaw Brothers before they sank into oblivion.
Tsui Hark: The movies that he made in his early days were too wild and unrestrained, so they never became popular. He did not get a breakthrough until his fourth film, All the Wrong Clues in 1981. By then, I had already made Challenge of the Gamesters. We have known each other for many years. He prefers martial arts films and digs themes from history, which combine the styles of Li Han-Hsiang and Chor Yuen. I dare say that I am as good as him in my understanding of martial arts novels and history, but what I don’t have is his endless childlike innocence and perseverance in production. In my personal opinion, his ability as a producer is better than that of a director because he is more objective. If you look at A Better Tomorrow, A Chinese Ghost Story, and Swordsman II, he did not direct them, but they are more impressive and memorable, therefore impressionable.
Michael Hui: He is my grandmaster, with Louis Lau as my master. As for Michael Hui, today’s young people may know his younger brother Samuel Hui better, but in the 1970s, I believe that all the young people were impressed by Michael’s talent. Before Stephen Chow debuted, no comedian in Hong Kong could surpass him. He began to live in semi-seclusion and stopped appearing on TV, believing that appearing on TV would weaken the audience’s desire to go to the theater to see him. In recent years, because I have the same friends, I have spent more time with my master Michael Hui, and we often drink red wine together. The idol-like attitude has gradually faded away, and we have become acquaintances with peers. But in my heart, he is always a great master and created a comedy era.
Johnnie To: He is his father’s third apprentice. He and I can be said to be brothers. I admire his hard work in running Milkyway Image, but it took two thousand weeks for him to become famous and be crowned Sir. His mastery of art, music, and drama is very accurate, and he does not need to spend a huge amount of money on each film to produce outstanding works. His films have the shadow of my father to a certain extent, which makes me feel particularly close to them. I like his persistence in the subject matter. In fact, he is a very nostalgic person. He loves to take photos of old Hong Kong and his favorite restaurant is “Lekofu” (the ending of The Mission takes place at “Lekofu”). He still sings karaoke. I often sing the theme songs of several TV series that we collaborated with my father on.
Peter Chan: In my eyes, he is a very smart and shrewd filmmaker. I joined Eric Tsang’s company, Alan & Eric Films Limited, and already knew him. He later worked at UFO, and that new style influenced me a lot. To be honest, my company BoB (Best of Best) is a copy of UFO, but it is a bit more philistine. Many people recommend his Comrades: Almost a Love Story or Bodyguards and Assassins, but personally I prefer He’s a Woman, She’s a Man and his final short in the Three anthology. In particular, Leon Lai’s performance in Three: Going Home is, I think, his best work. In the past few years, Peter has also made a big splash in China, and his style has also shifted to action movies. But I still prefer his romance films and ghost films. I don’t want to compare in terms of directorial techniques, but for a film company, I think he is really a good person to learn from.
Wong Kar-Wai: In the early 1990s, the media had deliberately classified me and him as polar opposites, but I had not even had a single chat with him at that time. Like me, he relied on Taiwanese funds to start business. Alan Tang was his middle man to Taiwan. In the beginning of 2000, I was doing an interview program for Metro Radio, and suddenly I had the idea to invite him to be a guest. He graciously accepted the invitation, and we made a good talk show, but because Metro’s listening rate was not high at the time, there was no commotion that came from it. But since then we have had tea occasionally.
Chang Cheh: I have a lot of admiration for him. His masculine action film packaging is still unmatched by any director today. Although John Woo is his apprentice, he never seems to be like him. Even Chow Yun-Fat’s Mark Gor in Woo’s A Better Tomorrow is only macho from time to time. Chang Cheh is my favourite Shaw Brothers director. Regardless, his best movies combine a stunning space and a running pace with a cunning grace. His movies are some of the best in the world. His pioneering use of symbolic contrast and slow motion in Chinese films gave me a hugh sense of amazement when I was in middle school. The interweaving of reality and stage in Vengeance is also extremely brilliant. Later it was copied by countless descendants. Decades later, my final memory of Chang Cheh is that he was deaf, so he could only communicate with pen and paper. I received a calligraphy painting from him as a gift. It’s a pity that he couldn’t talk in detail. I wish that we spoke more when I was working at Shaw Brothers.
Stephen Chow: He is the most talented person in the Chinese film industry. His acting skills are just like his personality. It is full of tricks but very spiritual, with an astonishingly rich sense of layering. I think that the scene in A Chinese Odyssey: Pandora’s Box where he sees Karen Mok’s character as a white-bone spirit in the demon mirror is the pinnacle of his work, and it was done by him. It was arranged to have six or seven completely different expressions in one shot, which was extremely difficult and unconventional. He should act in a non-comedy and I believe he can reach the same high level.
