SCUD Hong Kong Film Director on his latest work “VOYAGE”(遊), PART 1

SCUD: “I used  to live precariously, harboring latent signs of DEPRESSION. Those were dark periods where I cannot plan or work.  I was fighting my inner demons. Departures of loved ones fueled painful feelings of loss. I therefore decided to make my “VOYAGE”遊 film project addressing how  mental angst can wreck a person’s life.”

1. Voyage is going to be your latest film to hit the screen. Can you tell us what the film is about and what are the themes explored?

“Voyage” is my 5^th film and may be the last of my productions for some time. While there’re far more films I want to make, a lot of things are pointing to at least a break.

 Like many hinging their passions on art and love, I used to live dangerously with depression for long. There were periods when I could neither plan nor commit to anything weeks away. Departures of loved ones complicated the feelings, and prompted me to make a film out of such unspeakable mental and spiritual statuses.

Starting with my own experience and those confided to me, “Voyage” was then enriched by profound stories from my actors, especially Leni Speidel, my leading actress of the film, who even brought her family to realize the unforgettable scenario. As usually I am in debt to artists collaborating with me.

It is worth mentioning that the film appeared to come to own life during the making. While I thought I was making a film of suicide and other premature deaths, I found myself shooting more and more after life scenes and it unfolded to me in the editing room to be a very different film, one that unveils the subconscious or unconscious of the film maker’s desperation to look beyond the supposing end of life.

Is life a dream, an imagination, or just a projection of our wishes? “Voyage” is for those who rather believe there being no end to the voyage of life, and is dedicated to the people who have departed but have never left our hearts.

 

2. It is also your first film, as we understand it, to be shot entirely in English? What are your motivations for doing an English language film, and how does the language relate to the story in the film?

 I shot the film in English because it is a more universal topic and story than my earlier works. It may be more convenient to my European and American audiences while the impact to Chinese audiences are minimal. It is slightly easier for me to make as majority of the cast is English speaking, though the film has very little dialogue anyway.

 

3. Audiences have come to expect controversial themes like homosexuality, rape and incest in your previous outings. How will Voyage be different from the others, and do you expect to raise even more eyebrows?

 I guess i will always meet the expectations of my audiences on new, controversial themes, for I reckon that being an important value of mine. The scenes of various spectacular deaths may raise many eyebrows but the profound meanings behind are what I wish can be revealed to my audiences, albeit in an atypical way.

 

4. It looks like a significant part of Voyage will be taking place on the sea or in water. Do you find an artistic quality to this medium that you feel or felt you had to explore? How does the setting in Voyage help to shape the overall look and feel in the film?

Indeed I have a deep obsession with sea, the absolute isolation and freedom. There is a psychologic test that says your feeling to the sea is your perception to life. I guess I was the first to shoot on the circular rafts, an unique scene of Hong Kong beaches, in my first two films, with totally naked boys and girls of course. The vessel the leading man sails on in “Voyage” is a moving version of that fantasy.

 

5. A lone voyage out at sea. Stories about departed people…. There seems to be an emphasis on the themes of isolation and possibly loneliness in Voyage. Is that what you intended?

Absolutely, and the helplessness, the freedom, the despair, the unrestrained imaginations in a confined dungeon that is so perfect an analogy of life…

 

 6. Another theme that is clearly portrayed in Voyage has got to be depression. Do you have any personal experiences with depression, either in yourself or people that you know? How do you think depression affects people? How does it affect the lead character in Voyage? 

 I have never been really acquainted with anyone not depressed, and depressed people live in a different world from those who are so lucky and also so pathetically unlucky to be out of it. People like the lead character in the film want to have their ironic stories heard, and I am doing exactly that thru “Voyage”.

 THIS INTERVIEW CONTINUES ON PART 2.

WATCH THIS SPACE.

 

HONG KONG FILM DIRECTOR SCUD shares his dark days of fighting.DEPRESSION.

SCUD on his controversial Art-House Film “VOYAGE” highlighting DEPRESSION and DEATHS.

SCUD: “I used  to live precariously, harboring latent signs of DEPRESSION. 

Those were dark periods where I cannot plan or work.  I was fighting my inner demons. 

Departures of loved ones fueled painful feelings of loss. 

I therefore decided to make my “VOYAGE”遊 film project addressing how  mental angst can wreck a person’s life.”

Watch this space for SCUD's PART 1  heartfelt interview real soon.

ASIAN SEX SYMBOL "ADONIS HE FEI". He's Hong Kong Art-house director SCUD's latest find.

“ADONIS He Fei, SCUD’s Newest Discovery.

 From NOW until CHINESE NEW YEAR 2015, we are FOCUSING on HONG KONG foremost Arthouse director SCUD.

New-Kid-on-the Block ala Sex Symbol opens up on his PEKING OPERA training, PET PEEVES and working alongside with his mentor, Film Director SCUD. 

AMPHETAMINE 安非他命 Hong Kong Movie Part 1. IF it’s CENSORSHIP, it’s MUCH ADO about EVERYTHING.

A CANDID INTERVIEW with FILM DIRECTOR SCUD.

From the onset, it’s apparent that AMPHETAMINE a Hong Kong production is sailing into an uncharted sea of controversies.

First, it is an ASIAN gay-genre movie, gloriously spiced with stark revelations of full frontal nudity.

And glory be, it’s a feast for your eyes as this artsy homo erotica leaves nothing to the imagination.

This is to say that the male leads gloriously and proudly strut their manhood unashamedly.

“And why not?” the film director quips,”Clothes are for putting on, they are not part of us. On the other hand, your body belongs to you and nobody can take that away from you.”

It is this charismatic mainland-born-and-Hong Kong-based director SCUD‘s third feature on a gay theme.

His earlier ventures were CITY WITHOUT BASEBALL (2007) and PERMANENT RESIDENCE (2008), a semi-biopic of the director himself.

AMPHETAMINE stars a handsome pair – poster boys BYRON PANG and THOMAS PRICE.

The plot weaves around a cute Chinese fitness trainerKAFKA (BYRON) who encounters a dashing financial consultant called DANIEL(THOMAS).

Of course we are led to believe that KAFKA is a straight guy with a lovelorn girl friend, whilst DANIEL is openly gay.

KAFKA and DANIEL fall madly in love with lust and assume that love can conquer almost everything, even with the drug addiction that KAFKA is prone to.

Can AMPHETAMINE, a psycho stimulant propel lovemaking to another uncharted realm of ecstasy?

Don’t even try – as the movie dictates, unless you looking for dire consequences!

Beware, don’t touch DRUGS as these can harm you, body and soul.

In all SCUD‘s films,it is always poetry-in-motion as we are treated to a brilliance of lush cinematography with classy lensing by creative Directors-of-Photography, as shown in the painstaking work of CHARLIE LAM in AMPHETAMINE.

There’s often, this lingering lilt in mood and tone,

one of intense loneliness, despair and gloom

when we learn that it’s a love affair that’s never meant to be, and that it’s doomed from the start.

Amie Olive pays homage to this film by with the stark poemONE OF THOSE NIGHTS:

“Washed over

with convulsions of heat and pain

Contorting moans

could be blindly mistaken as pleasure

If only

to be held in welcoming arms

A moment

of unexpected warmth and comfort

The reminder

of walking this path alone tonight

Chilling tremors

rake across my spine in realization

Another burst

takes hold of my breath and heart

Watery orbs

blur my vision as a stinging kaleidoscope.”

The HONG KONG TV and ENTERTAINMENT AUTHORITYrecently demanded snippings to be made to several key scenes depicting anal intercourse (where KAFKA is raped by a gang of 4) to be deleted before the commercial public viewing.

Paradoxically, this film was permitted to screen without cuts at the closing of the 34th Hong Kong International FilmFestival 2010.

Citing double standards, SCUD appealed to the Chief Executive DONALD TSANG.

The end results?

The censored shots were totally “blackened out”, but the accompanying sound and painful moans stayed untouched, much to the chagrin of the film director.

It is a case of much ado about everything in this fickle minded entertainment industry pertaining the rights and wrongs of competent censorship.

Every country has it own set of rules and how far can a film director stretch his creative freedom?

What price ART?

Follow up on PART 2 to uncover more candid revelations. The controversial albeit personable film director airs his opinions on the CENSORSHIP issue.

AMPHETAMINE 安非他命 Hong Kong Movie Part 2. “My PASSION is ONLY to make the FILMS that I really WANT to make.” – SCUD.

SCUD – Writer/Producer/Director of AMPHETAMINE

LAWRENCE LAU - Executive Director

A CANDID INTERVIEW WITH SCUD, FILM DIRECTOR

SCUD could be the kind of director whose works would be as profound and enduring as that of surrealism, or cubism on painting.

Or at least, this is how I feel.

He aspires for creative freedom fearlessly, without sanctions,

and he pursues his artistic vision with a relentless fervor.

“My MISSION is ONLY to make the FILMS that I really want to make, and to tell the kind of stories I want to tell, no less.”

Here’s SCUD – up, close and personal:

1. In working on a sensitivity-laced film such as AMPHETAMINE, you do know that you are treading on an almost taboo subject in ASIA. No film maker wants to be seen as if he is promoting drugs in a movie, right?

It is a question of value. Precisely because nobody is doing this, there is extra significance in my work.

The name could promote the drug, but the content would not, and we’re in the 21st century now. Drug is a taboo and drug users are conveniently stereotyped into evil persons, unfortunately and unreasonably. But even a soul that’s influenced by drug and abandoned by fate can be beautiful and loving, and that’s the story of “Amphetamine”. I am not that concerned with what I am seen as anyway.

My films have tremendous followers in mainland China but can never be released there. As such, there is no chance to reclaim the investment from Asia. My hope is in Europe and Americas and the door opens a little bit lately after Berlinale.

2. You have a co-DIRECTOR to help you with this movie? Or you helm AMPHETAMINE alone?

Lawrence Lau, who I co-directed “City without Baseball” with, is an executive director of “Amphetamine”.

3. Did the two lead characters in the film KAFKA and DANIEL resort to Amphetamine to enhance their love making, or it was KAFKA who introduced DANIEL to the world of drugs? How did the Amphetamine issue come about?

Kafka is the guy bothered by Amphetamine. Daniel has been quite clean but he jumps into it to understand Kafka’s world, out of love. Kafka took Amphetamine because he needed to work multiple jobs to try to sustain the ailing life of his mother, and the illusion also served to bring back memory of his childhood before his father was framed by a corrupted cop and took his life.

I apply drug in the film also as an analogy to love, therefore the catch line “There is no way to quit a fateful love”,

4. You have a competent Director of Photography in this film. Please say something about him?

Charlie Lam is probably the best in HK I’d say. He won the best cinematographer in San Sebastian a few years ago, and happens to be a classmate of my younger brother. We’ve always want to work together and Amphetamine is not going to be the last: my 5th film “Voyage” should be shot by him again.

We’ve spent a lot of time exchanging our views to the film before actually shooting, and reached a common consensus on how to make the film most poetic and operative, and I think somehow we make it.

5. How is your on-set working relationship with BYRON PANG and THOMAS PRICE when directing these actors? Who amongst the two appears to have the stronger potential?

The best you can think of between a director and his actors. I’ve known Thomas for 3 years and had a close relationship with Byron in the year preceding the shooting. They know the stories thoroughly and there are actually quite some of their past built into the script. I really can’t say who is better although Byron’s performance has been almost indisputable, but Thomas also surprises for a guy being so gorgeous and can act that well.

6. Do we detect a HIDDEN MESSAGE or MORAL that AMPHETAMINE is trying to say to the audience?

My films usually don’t carry any message. I am just trying to tell some stories that touched my heart. I do prefer to write and shoot stories about minorities though.

7. How are the box office takings of AMPHETAMINE in Hong Kong during the commercial screening in April? Are you happy with the results or it could have been much better? Can Hong Kong accept openly gay films?

We’re into the 4th week now (April 2010) and our seats per show are still the highest among films at the same time, continue to enjoy full house in prime time. Have I become rich? No, because I’ve got only 17 shows in the opening day and cut to 5 or 6 soon afterwards, less than one tenth of most mainstream releases, in spite of the fact that it is a Berlinale Panorama film and also the closing film of HKIFF (Hong Kong International Film Festival).

My film is not lack of audiences, but lack support of cinemas. The DVD of my previous film, “Permanent Residence” has been at the top 10 of HMV chart for over 6 months now, beating the so call major issues by miles.

It surprises me that HK accept gay films and topics less than Taiwan.

8. The Censorship Board in Hong Kong ordered several cuts to a male rape scene in AMPHETAMINE and finally allow these scenes to be blackened out …. what is your feeling about the whole matter?

In Germany, a common question to me was: “How’s your film received in China?”, and I had to take time to explain to them that Hong Kong is not the same as China, and then…

My friends have been telling me that HK censorship is moving backward. I believe it now as “Permanent Residence” passed without problem and “Amphetamine” runs into this.

I was so disappointed that I wrote an open letter to Donald Tsang, the first statement being: “We are born with eyes, with the natural right to watch the world”

And then in the closing ceremony of HKIFF, I open my speech with: “Penis gave us life, breast nurtured us, if those are deemed obscene, no parts of us is clean.”

Why would a small group of people have the right to limit what we can and can not see after all? Are they gods?

9. Have you gotten a worldwide distributor for AMPHETAMINE yet? When do you plan to release the DVD FORMAT and will there be a DIRECTOR’S CUT version?

Yes and my worldwide sales company, Media Luna is based in Germany. The film has been sold to quite a number of European countries such as Germany, France and Greece, and I’m looking forward to the theatrical release later this year. At least I’m confident that German audiences like my film as all 5 screenings in Berlin were sold out way before the festival, and I heard their response. The DVD will be out probably in autumn but the full uncut version may have to wait till the Taiwan release. I was told there that they will never cut any of my films, an encouraging message.

10. What is the LATEST PROJECT you are currently EMBARKING ON ….is it another GAY-GENRE type ?

It's called LOVE ACTUALLY .... SUCKS! and it's about 6 real, mostly court case love stories happened in recent years. They are not fairy tales and do not have happy ending, some even very dreadful. I made this film for the love not celebrated.

A groom had an affair with his best man, a married painter fell for a male life drawing model, brother and sister in love, dancing partners with 40 years in between, a lesbian couple of RPG (Role Play Paranoid) , and a fatal love triangle…you may say this is not a pure gay film but the GLBT is heavily weight.

- END of INTERVIEW -

There’s a BUDDHIST adage that says:

“If our life and conduct are ordered by our likes and dislikes, we are weaklings, puppets and bond slaves, apt to be overwhelmed by indolence and incompetence, ill-health and frustration.”

And in the search for artistic freedom in the 21st century, how far can a film maker go without being indicted about breaking taboos in religion or creed?

Every decade brings it own set of rules:

the world is undergoing a powerful wave of sweeping changes in ART.

Barriers are gradually disappearing with consumer behavior changing rapidly. New technologies are bridging new ways of evaluating the subject matter.

New markets, new audiences, each brings with it new information that will modify the old impression.

Again, what price ART?

Only time can really tell.