FOR A DOWN-TO-EARTH take on the real Hong Kong, look no further than Fruit Chan. His films offer a raw, often bleak, view of life of Hong Kong's working class. And his latest offering, Hollywood Hong Kong, is no different. The second part of a trilogy on prostitution, it opened the 26th Hong Kong International Film Festival on Wednesday. Durian Durian, the first in the series, kicked off the festival in 1997. Clearly Chan is on a roll. But the recognition has not gone to his head. Far from it. With his easy manner and ready smile, he remains as unpretentious as his films.
Chan, 44, comes from the school of hard knocks. What he has achieved is thanks to his own hard work. Born on Hainan Island, he was brought up reading Mao Zedong's Little Red Book. There were no science or technology lessons at school. Instead he was taught that capitalism was the enemy. But the fierce communism did have its benefits.
'We watched a lot of films. Before the Cultural Revolution Chinese movies were very good, and we also saw films from other Communist countries like Russia, Romania, Albania, South Korea and Vietnam,' Chan said.
But the Cultural Revolution put restraints on the films deemed appropriate and eventually only eight movies were considered acceptable. Soon after that Chan's parents moved to Hong Kong.
'At school we were always being told that capitalism was a bad system, so my brother and I couldn't understand why my parents moved here,' he said.
They arrived in July 1971, on the day of Bruce Lee's funeral. Chan had never heard of the actor, but gleaned details of his life from the newspaper and gossip on the street.