HK-mainland co-productions take five film awards
Hong Kong veteran artist Deanie Ip Tak-han won the best actress prize at the Asian Film Awards last night for her performance as an ageing maid in the drama A Simple Life.
The glitzy event also saw two Hong Kong-mainland co-productions become big winners this year, sweeping five prizes.
But the coveted best film and best director awards were bagged by the intense Iranian domestic drama Nader and Simin, A Separation, written and directed by Asghar Farhadi. It also took home the best screenwriter and best editor awards.
The film took the best foreign language prize at the Academy Awards last month, becoming the first Iranian movie to win at the Oscars.
Hong Kong-mainland production Wu Xia, a martial-arts thriller directed by renowned Hong Kong filmmaker Peter Chan Ho-sun, won the best cinematographer, best production designer and best composer honours. Another martial-arts epic and the world's first such 3-D flick, The Flying Swords of Dragon Gate by Tsui Hark, won the best visual effects and best costume designer awards.
Ip, 64, won over the judges with her turn as a dedicated maid in an adaptation of a true story about a heartwarming relationship between her ('Sister Peach') and a young master in a big family. She won the same honour at the Venice International Film Festival last year.
Ip said: 'The role was actually not hard to play because I'm an old woman; my heavy make-up to appear young tonight was harder.'
Her intimate young master in the film, Andy Lau Tak-wah, lost the best actor contest to Donny Damara of Indonesian production Lovely Man.
The awards are organised by the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society.
In all, 32 films from 11 countries and territories competed for 14 awards.
