Clarke added that all he wanted to do with his work was to advocate a gentler and more measured approach that Western countries such as the United States could take towards China, as it would be universally beneficial.

“China and America, if they can put down their rivalries and their enmities, there is no more powerful force on the planet than these two superpowers if they decide that they want something done,” he said.

“If they decide, for example, that they want global warming to stop … if the two biggest superpowers on the planet decided that it’s going to happen, it will happen.”

Clarke, who won Oscars in 1989 and 2014 for documentaries on a cancer patient and a mother detained in a Nazi prison camp, respectively, also counts more recent productions such as Better Angels in 2018 under his belt. That film aimed to present a more balanced view of China to foreign audiences than that of news coverage of then US president Donald Trump’s attacks on the country.

Hong Kong Returns, Clarke’s latest work, comprises a series of 10 films, each spanning only 10 minutes, re-examining the city’s social unrest from June to November of 2019. All 10 are available on the streaming platform Vimeo.

Through interviews with opinion leaders and analysts, such as pro-establishment lawmaker Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee, academic and former senior official Christine Loh Kung-wai, Post chief news editor Yonden Lhatoo, political risk analyst Phill Hynes, and writer Nury Vittachi, the series explores the underlying social causes of the 2019 anti-government unrest and whether it could have been choreographed or even funded by external forces.

Clarke said he was in Hong Kong for another film when the extradition bill protests broke out in June 2019. The development of the movement, and the “oversimplified” Western portrayal of it as “David and Goliath” between Hong Kong protesters and the Chinese Communist Party gave him the idea of creating the documentary series.

“I did feel it was worth responding to a narrative that I felt was rather poorly reported,” he said.

“[Foreign media outlets] were dumbing down what I thought was a very complicated situation and a very complicated city … [Hong Kong] is not an easy city to put into a 60-second sound bite, so I was rather dismayed by the quality and the level and the lack of analysis of reporting in the West.”

He said production of the series was delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic and travel restrictions. But he was glad that with the help of the Post, which provided some of the footage for the series, the work could be released to mark the 25th anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to Chinese rule.

Asked why the documentary series did not include any voices from the opposition camp, Clarke said he had interviewed at least one prominent young activist from the bloc, but decided not to use the material to protect the individual from the Beijing-imposed national security law, enacted in Hong Kong in June 2020 to prohibit acts of secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces. Clarke also asked the Post not to disclose the name of the activist.

“I make no claims that this series is the definitive story of Hong Kong in 2019, definitely not. The only thing that I claim is that it’s one man’s personal look at what I saw on the streets,” he said.

“We’ve tried very hard to find people on both sides of the political divide to represent their points of view in the film … and although the yellow side is certainly unrepresented, they get plenty of screen time, and we showed what they were doing.”

Clarke is currently working on a theatrical film showing how lovers, families, friends and colleagues in Hong Kong were divided in 2019 due to differences in political views.