Soi Cheang Pou-soi’s Limbo leads the field for the 40th Hong Kong Film Awards with a remarkable 14 nominations, the organisers announced at a press conference on Wednesday. A visually striking, black-and-white crime thriller that tells a nihilistic tale of despair and redemption set in a city rotten to the ground, Limbo stars Lam Ka-tung and Mason Lee as a pair of police detectives on the hunt of a serial murderer. Limbo has been one of the most critically acclaimed Hong Kong films in the past year, having garnered four nominations (and two wins , for best sound and production design) at last year’s Asian Film Awards. It also won best picture and best actress (for Cya Liu Ya-se) at the 2021 Hong Kong Film Critics Society awards, announced in January. Cheang’s film is followed by Longman Leung Lok-man ’s hugely popular Anita Mui biopic Anita (with 12 nominations) and Jun Li Jun-shuo ’s gritty poverty drama Drifting (with 11), both of which are nominated for best picture. The other best picture nominees are Zero to Hero , the wholesome sports biopic that was earlier chosen as the city’s submission to the Oscars for best international feature film, and Raging Fire , the final film by director Benny Chan Muk-sing, who died of cancer in August 2020. While Lam Ka-tung cements his leading-man status with two best actor nods (for Limbo and Hand Rolled Cigarette ), it is perhaps a sign of the rise of the next generation that all five nominees for best new performer have also been recognised in either the main or supporting acting categories they belong to, with Anita star Louise Wong being the stand-out candidate of the lot. Another rare occurrence sees the veteran production designer and art director Man Lim-chung being nominated for best director for a documentary; the awards’ main categories have been traditionally reserved for fiction features. But anyone who has seen Keep Rolling , his enthralling portrait of film legend Ann Hui On-wah, would welcome the exception. The nomination list for this current edition of the Hong Kong Film Awards includes films released theatrically both in 2020 and 2021, after the 2021 edition was cancelled due to repeated closure of cinemas amid the Covid-19 pandemic. As cinemas in Hong Kong have remained closed since the first week of January, and the city’s Covid-19 situation looks to be getting worse every day as the Omicron variant spreads, it is a faint but undoubtedly daunting possibility that it might be another two years before we see the next edition of the awards. The full list of nominations is as follows: Best film Raging Fire , Anita , Limbo , Zero to Hero , Drifting Best director Man Lim-chung ( Keep Rolling ), Benny Chan ( Raging Fire ), Longman Leung ( Anita ), Soi Cheang ( Limbo ), Peter Chan ( Leap ) Best screenplay One Second Champion , Time , Limbo , Zero to Hero , Drifting Best actor Lam Ka-tung ( Hand Rolled Cigarette ), Patrick Tse ( Time ), Lam Ka-tung ( Limbo ), Leung Chung-hang ( Zero to Hero ), Francis Ng ( Drifting ) Best actress Chrissie Chau ( Madalena ), Louise Wong ( Anita ), Cya Liu ( Limbo ), Sandra Ng ( Zero to Hero ), Gong Li ( Leap ) Best supporting actor Louis Koo ( Anita ), Lam Suet ( Time ), Fung Ho-yeung ( Zero to Hero ), Will Or ( Drifting ), Tse Kwan-ho ( Drifting ) Best supporting actress Paw Hee-ching ( Caught in Time ), Fish Liew ( Anita ), Chung Suet-ying ( Time ), Fish Liew ( Limbo ), Bai Lang ( Leap ), Loletta Lee ( Drifting ) Best new performer Louise Wong ( Anita ), Chung Suet-ying ( Time ), Leung Chung-hang ( Zero to Hero ), Fung Ho-yeung ( Zero to Hero ), Will Or ( Drifting ) Best cinematography Hand Rolled Cigarette , Raging Fire , Anita , Love After Love , Limbo Best film editing Hand Rolled Cigarette , Shock Wave 2 , The Battle at Lake Changjin , Raging Fire , Limbo Best art direction Hand Rolled Cigarette , Anita , Love After Love , Limbo , Drifting Best costume and make-up design Hand Rolled Cigarette , Dynasty Warriors , Anita , Love After Love , Limbo Best action choreography One Second Champion , Hand Rolled Cigarette , Shock Wave 2 , Raging Fire , Limbo Best original film score Anita , Love After Love , Limbo , Zero to Hero , Drifting Best original film song One Second Champion , The Way We Keep Dancing , Raging Fire , Zero to Hero , Drifting Best sound design Shock Wave 2 , The Battle at Lake Changjin , Raging Fire , Anita , Limbo Best visual effects Shock Wave 2 , The Battle at Lake Changjin , Raging Fire , Anita , Limbo Best new director Chiu Sin-hang ( One Second Champion ), Chan Kin-long ( Hand Rolled Cigarette ), Man Lim-chung ( Keep Rolling ), Lau Ho-leung ( Caught in Time ), Jun Li ( Drifting ) Best Asian Chinese language film Till We Meet Again , America Girl , My Missing Valentine Want more articles like this? Follow SCMP Film on Facebook