Christmas may have come early for Francis Kao Wai-ho, founder and co-chief executive of Imagi International: a Hong Kong firm that, as Boto International, was once the world's largest manufacturer of imitation Christmas trees. Kao is hoping four mutant turtles will help him put to rest the controversy that surrounded the sale of the Christmas-tree business, when the company took an astonishing change in course - into the digital-animation movie business. Kao wanted to rival Pixar Animation Studios but few thought he could do it.
Fast forward about five years and Imagi has taken a significant step towards challenging the likes of DreamWorks Animation SKG, Sony Pictures Animation and Pixar, now part of the Walt Disney Company. Imagi's 3D, computer-generated (CG) TMNT (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) - the cinematic rebirth of this storied franchise - was released last week in Hong Kong. Last weekend, it topped the US box office charts, with takings of US$25.5 million. The film is backed by heavyweight Hollywood distributors Warner Bros and the Weinstein Company - not to mention strong word-of-mouth endorsement from fans worldwide.
In the wake of TMNT, Imagi has plans for a slew of new CG-animation movies based on Japanese anime franchises Science Ninja Team Gatchaman and Astro Boy. But whatever else Imagi achieves, it will be remembered for giving a new lease of life to Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo and Donatello, the four pizza-loving, anthropomorphic, mutant brother turtles.
The Ninja Turtles began life in the 1980s as characters drawn by American artists Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, founders of comic-book publisher Mirage Studios. They published a one-off comic that became an instant hit, spawning an animated television series that ran from 1987 to 1996. The plot focused on four turtles - plus a rat named Splinter - who had mutated to humanoid proportions after coming into contact with a mysterious ooze in the New York sewer system. The wise Splinter became the turtles' mentor and equipped them with martial-arts skills and weapons to battle evil.
But it was the first live-action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film, featuring actors dressed in rubber suits, that began what has proved to be an enduring relationship between the half-shell heroes and Hong Kong. As Kao admits, Hong Kong has done well from the Ninja Turtles franchise. 'The Ninja Turtles have a special bond with Hong Kong. They have [already] helped two very successful companies: Golden Harvest [movie studio] and Playmates [toymaker],' he says.
Golden Harvest Entertainment sowed what would be a bountiful crop when studio bosses decided to tap the fanaticism the TV show was generating among youngsters in North America and put the lean, green heroes on the big screen. 'We found out that Ninja Turtles toys and the TV show were so popular with the kids in the US and that the Ninja Turtle live-action motion picture rights were available, so we licensed the rights and produced the first movie,' recalls David Chan Sik-hong, executive director at Golden Harvest.