Hong Kong, city we no longer know, the theme of crowdfunded film by Rita Hui
Filmmaker Rita Hui hopes her latest feature will shake people out of their indifference to recent political events in the city
In life, you have to roll with the punches. That's why director Rita Hui Nga-shu quickly assembled her small crew in the small hours of December 7 last year and dashed to the tent village on Harcourt Road to start shooting. Rumours were rife that police were about to clear the site that had become the epicentre of the umbrella movement, and Hui felt she had to film actor Lo Chun-yip against this watershed event in Hong Kong history.
As it turned out, all was quiet at the barricades that morning. But unless there are further street clashes this summer, the moody montage from last year will probably form the final images of her third feature film, Pseudo Secular.
A lecturer at the school of creative media at City University, Hui, 39, conceived the project three years ago to try to make some sense of the conflicts that kept erupting across the city.
As she began developing a script in 2012, controversies arose, such as the eviction of Choi Yuen Tsuen residents, the mega-budget express rail link with Guangzhou and efforts to introduce so-called national education into the school curriculum to nurture patriotism.
"Hong Kong's troubles have not stopped. I feel I have to pen a story to reflect the city's woes," Hui says.
She hopes her independent movie will deliver a punch like Les quatre cents coups (The 400 Blows), Francois Truffaut's debut feature about a misunderstood teenager who is seen as a troublemaker. "Towards the end of the movie, the boy runs away from a detention centre only to find he has nowhere to go when he arrives at the seaside; it is precisely what we have been feeling about Hong Kong for the past few years - we have no way out. We are desperate," says Hui.
Pseudo Secular involves eight characters whose three storylines express Hui's observations and unease about shifts in Hong Kong society. They include a troubled social activist who becomes close to the mother of his girlfriend after she is jailed for taking part in a rally, a poorly paid barista and his mainland girlfriend, as well as the third-generation owner of a soy sauce factory, a news reporter, and a dropout who becomes an internet sensation through her charismatic selfies.