When local animators were asked to develop Hong Kong's first collective animation project, they were given no rules, criteria or guidelines - just a novel to read.
Wo Cheng was written by well-known local author XiXi in the late 1970s and depicted the hopes of a nostalgic, fictional city not unlike Hong Kong. It was used as the inspirational basis for i-city, a compilation of animated short films, each evoking different aspects of Hong Kong life.
I-city premiered as the opening film of the 10th Hong Kong Independent Short Film and Video Awards (IFVA) in March this year and has returned to select theatres this month and next. The nine films were created by 13 animators, all previous IFVA winners.
The animators each have their own visions of the city and these are clearly carried into their work. The films encapsulate unique facets of the Hong Kong experience: from the repetition of a family's daily life in Nonsense Noise to the epitome of the working person in The Tired City.
Animation group Rice 5 contributed Corroder - poignant at times and gruesome at others, the film explores greed, in the form of a young boy who lives in a housing estate with his family. He is constantly bullied by a gang due to his abnormal tongue and he eventually develops a strange appetite for destruction.
Corroder came from the combined talents of Kevin Tsang Fung-chi, Tom Shum Ka-chun and Andrew Lee Hau-yan - three of the four members of the Rice 5 group. The fourth member, Snowman Tsang Funk-kee, developed his own contribution with another partner.
