Really, Mr Wong, take a good look at your average Hong Kong film. Boy meets pretty girl but is torn between his love for her and his loyalty to his big brother and triad gang. It normally ends with one or other being inadvertently run over and killed during a chase. Yawn. Limp story with ham acting.

Apart from some of Ann Hui On-wah's films and a few other exceptions, most locally produced films of the past two decades look like they are aimed at 13-year-old audiences.

David Grant, Shouson Hill

If something has to be blamed for the quality of local films, it should be the film industry - not the audience - and the investors who have no vision or courage.

There is no reason to believe the industry doesn't have enough new blood, both in front of and behind the cameras. But have they been given the opportunities they deserve?

I find it ridiculous that Wong blames the loss of competitiveness of Hong Kong films on the audience.

Name and address supplied

Most Hong Kong people see films as a form of entertainment. That's fine. However, what Wong Kar-wai says about local audiences is true. They lack hunger and curiosity. What they also lack is an international perspective. Hong Kong's image as an international city is fading.

Though it sounds trivial, I still remember how badly Wim Wenders, the famous German director, was introduced at the Hong Kong Film Awards before he presented a weighty trophy. Hong Kong audiences need nurturing to become more mature, not necessarily in schools (but having film culture in the school curriculum would be exciting) or some government programme, but through the media and the industry itself.

The relationship between the quality of the audiences and the filmmakers, however, is sometimes a question of chicken and egg.

Lee Yuk Yi , Ho Man Tin

Q How can the government improve its response to emergencies?

I was slightly perturbed to read comments made by P.A. Crush on Mondays' traffic chaos (Talkback, May 13). He has laid the blame directly on private car drivers and has taken the moral high ground by asking the question: 'When will Hong Kong private car owners learn they are better off on foot or using public transport?'

I was caught in this traffic chaos on Monday. Was I driving a car? No. I was on the 89C bus trying to get back to Sha Tin from Tsim Sha Tsui. It took me nearly two hours to get back. I assume buses are included under the general term of public transport. Why was I on the bus and not the train? Because I had heard no warnings and assumed by normal standards that my journey would take at most 40 minutes, even in rush hour.

While sitting on the bus, I noticed that we were flanked by at least 12 other buses, all stuck in the traffic. So, according to Mr Crush's comments, are we stupid and ignorant bus users?

The blame for the chaos on Monday rests with the transport bureau only. Not only were car drivers stuck in the traffic, so were bus users, truck drivers and taxi passengers. Mr Crush has tried to use Monday's events as an excuse to air an anti-car agenda. He mentions electronic road charging. This would have had no effect on Monday's traffic jams whatsoever.

I do not own a car, so I have no agenda as a private motorist. What I do know is that I was a part of that traffic jam as a paying public transport customer. The only thing that would have prevented me from being stuck in that traffic would have been a message from authorities telling me to get on a train instead.

John Keers, Sha Tin

Q Do entertainment venues have a valid argument against the smoking ban?

It is true that investors are wary of spending money on entertainment venues right now, as is being claimed by the Entertainment Business Rights Concern Group. But it is unlikely to be because of the proposed smoking ban but rather the justified fear that business owners are breaking the law and dragging investors down with them.

Through the liquor licensing process, Clear the Air has been informing businesses that right now, under existing labour laws, every director of every company is liable to a $200,000 fine and six months in jail if they do not provide a healthy work environment. We have heard no argument from the Liquor Licensing Board that an Air Pollution Index of well over 200 all day, every day, can be considered hygienic - a requirement for a liquor licence.

By the time the proposed smoking ban is enacted we will be able to sue every single director of every company that holds a liquor licence because the owners have declared in front of a statutory body that they are making their employees sick, and doing it on purpose - hardly the kind of behaviour that instils confidence in an investor.

We would suggest that these people refrain from telling investors that business owners can break labour laws and still protect their investment from the costs of the legal challenges that will surely follow. The best way to protect their investments is to support the smoking ban. In places with large ethnic Chinese populations like Singapore, Toronto, New York and California, whose entertainment venues have kicked the tobacco habit, the entertainment business is doing quite well indeed.

Annelise Connell, Clear the Air

On other matters...

So a spokesman for the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department says it has yet to receive any complaints about the conditions of the stream in the festering eyesore that is Pokfulam Village. Well, that makes everything alright then.

I suppose when the dengue explosion does occur there will be a knee-jerk reaction, much wringing of hands and a committee set up to investigate the cause.

There is a very obvious remedy: rehouse the squatters forthwith and clean up the entire area. This will, of course, cost money - but possibly not as much as was squandered on Harbourfest or lost in the non-tendering exercise at Cyberport.

This 'village' is an affront to modern-day Hong Kong and its claim to be Asia's World City. It may have escaped the notice of the relevant authorities, but mosquitoes actually fly and we have reached the stage where residents of nearby private housing estates are becoming afraid to let their children play outside in the early evening for fear of them being eaten alive by mosquitoes.

I can't speak for the public housing estates but I have no doubt that the thousands of residents there are equally tormented. For once, can we have government action and not reaction?

B.J. Carroll, South Horizons

What's up with Central? Every day on the Queen's Road footpath (across from the Landmark) there is a full-on carnival of fake brand-name purses and other goods being sold illegally on carts. This never fails to cause a bottleneck of pedestrian traffic and shows the many tourists in the area just how seriously Hong Kong is tackling copied products.

Since this happens day in and day out, I would like to know if the police in Central are in league with these lawbreakers and receive a cut, or are they just incompetent?

Name and address supplied