Director of film on gay Chinese takes aim at British stereotypes
Film director Ray Yeung Yaw-kae hopes his tale of two gay Chinese men in London will tear down stereotypes of Chinese people in the British media.
'No British films talk about British Chinese,' said Yeung, whose debut feature film, Cut Sleeve Boys, is a contender in the Hong Kong International Film Festival's Asian Digital Competition.
'In the UK, there's a lack of representation of Chinese on TV or movies. The only Chinese you can see on TV or movies are illegal immigrants, gangsters or prostitutes who can barely speak English,' he says. 'It's very frustrating. Chinese people don't just run restaurants. Lots of them do great jobs like lawyers. It's scarily backward in the UK. In the US, Lucy Liu was in Charlie's Angels not because of her 'Chinese-ness' but because she was right for the role.'
Billed as the first Chinese-British gay film, Cut Sleeve Boys takes its title from a tale originating in the Han Dynasty.
It portrays two openly gay Chinese-British men, Mel and Ash, searching for the meaning of their lives and relationships. The two friends are shown in control of their lives, rather than being seen as go-go boys fishing for sugar daddies.
'I want to show people that they have bargaining power,' Yeung says. 'For example, Mel takes a younger lover from the country and turns him into a cosmopolitan man.'
Yeung, also the chief of the Hong Kong Lesbian and Gay Film Festival, has been living in Britain since his early teens. More than a decade ago, he left a well-paid job as a lawyer.
'I did law because I believed in justice. But then I realised the legal system only catered for the ruling class with more money,' he said. 'I questioned myself; do I want to spend the rest of my life doing that or get out and do something that can make a difference?'
Yeung made several shorts before making Cut Sleeve Boys with a high-definition digital camera. He said he had been lucky in the making of the film, receiving help from many people, including veteran actress and singer Rebecca Pan Di-hua, who agreed to let him use her Mandarin classics on the soundtrack free of charge.
Yeung says that compared with the rest of Asia, Hong Kong is the most open towards the gay community.
'Racism exists on the international gay scene. Chinese gay men have a low ranking in the gay hierarchy because they don't fulfil the classical male beauty,' he says.
'I know some Asians who have switched to dating Asians.'
While the film has found distributors in the US and many countries in Europe, Yeung is hoping the film will be picked up by a Hong Kong distributor.
'It is not the next Brokeback Mountain, but at least it deals with the issue of our times,' he says.
Cut Sleeve Boys screens at 7pm today and 3pm on Sunday at City Hall.
