Critter spottings on a hike from Shek Kong to Ho Pui

Can you see the two critters in the above picture?  

(You may need to click to enlarge the image ;b)

 

Is that a Paris Peacock I see before me?

 

After not going out hiking for weeks, I've now been out hiking twice this week!  What's even more amazing is that, despite the Hong Kong Observatory's forecast for today having included showers and even thunderstorms (and it in fact having rained in a large percentage of Hong Kong), I didn't feel more than a few rain drops over the course of the 7.8 kilometer hike that I went on over on the northern edge of Tai Lam Country Park!

 

Upon checking the weather forecast earlier in the week and seeing what had been predicted for today, the two friends and I had come up with a contingency plan to go for yum cha at Chuen Lung if it was raining when we met up at Tsuen Wan West (from where we would be boarding a bus to take us into the countryside to the north).  But since conditions were on the clear (even if overcast) side when we met at the appointed place and time, we opted to stick to our plan to go hiking; with the chosen route from Shek Kong to Ho Pui being entirely paved, flat and wide -- and thus easy enough to go along with umbrella in hand if the need did arise.

 

While it may be on the physically unchallenging side, the trail we went along is by no means uninteresting; what with it passing by the Farm Milk Company (where one can get fresh milk and milk pudding), an eco-garden that's home to lots of flowering plants beloved by butterflies, a couple of irrigation reservoirs and a small but pretty waterfall.  Indeed, I like it so much that I've been along it around five times now (albeit with minor variations in the route on a couple of occasions)!

 

With abundant foliage growing in the area, I find this shady trail to be particularly pleasant during the times of the year when the sun is likely to shine pretty fiercely.  Something else that makes this unnamed trail attractive to me in the warmer months is that lots of critter spottings can be made; with way more butterflies being spotted on today's hike than the one I went on in Tai Tam Country Park earlier this week.

 

Among today's critter spotting highlights were a couple of eye-catching Paris Peacock swallowtail butterflies, grasshoppers camouflaged to look like chunks of wood and one of those long-tailed lizards whose tails are around three times lengthier than their bodies.  More than incidentally, the lizard was spotted in fairly close proximity to a small butterfly which my friends and I were thinking might have been the reptile's intended meal if not for our presence having made it decide to turn tail and disappear into the undergrowth away from our prying eyes!

Signs that spring has come before the rainy season begins in earnest this year!

Before the rain fell

Lots of flowers and plants are already in bloom...

 

...and mating season has begun for some wildlife! ;b

 

Between my trip to Phuket and the Hong Kong International Film Festival occupying a good chunk of my time last month, I didn't do as much hiking as I should have.  And after seeing that the rainy season looked to be getting going in earnest from today (with many consecutive days of precipitation), I decided I had better go spend some time outdoors before the heavens opened with a vengeance.  

 

With the air already heavy with humidity and a high temperature for the day of around the 30 degrees Celsius, I opted for an afternoon hike in Tai Tam Country Park that began at a bus stop in Wong Nai Chung Gap and ended some three hours later at a green minibus stop in a residential section of Braemar Hill.  Along the way, I passed by, as well as caught sight of, three of the Tai Tam Reservoirs -- which were a study in contrast in terms of one being pretty full, another being completely empty and the third being not completely empty but also far from being completely full.

 

While the water levels at the reservoirs didn't look as terribly low as around this time last year, seeing them got me realizing that not that much rain has fallen in recent months.  At the same time though, much of the foliage was reassuringly and splendidly green.  Also, there are a lot of flowers in full bloom already, including those of the Red Azalea and Gordonia plants, which add lovely splotches of color to views of the Hong Kong countryside.

Since flowers bloom in winter in Hong Kong as well as the warmer seasons (with the Chinese New Year flower famously blooming, as its name implies, around the Chinese New Year period), however, I don't tend to equate their presence with spring, as would be the case in many other parts of the world.  Instead, the signs that really signal that spring is here for me are my being able to spot a lot of varieties of critters out and about (including butterflies that actually stop to be photographed rather than just seem to want to flit about all day) over the course of a hike, including ones which have decided that the time has come to go about procreating!

 

And for those who wonder, in view of my having captured so many creatures enacting such acts: no, I really don't go in search of copulating critters.  Indeed, in the warmer months, I tend to be more on the look out for snakes -- and not because I especially want to spot these slithery reptiles but because I really don't want to accidentally step on them and thereby be the target of their often downright poisonous ire!

 

At the same time though, I must admit that the sighting of the amorous pair of critters was one high point of this particular hike; this particularly since I had previously never come across wasp moths performing this act before and so now can add my shots of them to the subset of my photography collection which has had friends labelling me "nature's pornographer"! :D  

Evans Chan's We Have Boots goes beyond umbrellas and into hearts (Film review)

Reading the writing(s) on the (Lennon) Wall

We Have Boots (Hong Kong, 2019)

- Evans Chan, director

Two days ago, a Hong Kong court found nine pro-democracy campaigners guilty of charges of varying levels of public nuisance pertaining to the street protests that took place in various parts of the territory close to five years ago.  A week earlier, I had attended a screening of the extended version of a documentary film by Evans Chan featuring interviews with a number of these individuals along with other political activists like Agnes Chow, Ray Wong and Alex Chow. 

A sequel to his Raise the Umbrellas (2016), We Have Boots documents the government backlash, especially in the past few years, against those making calls for genuine universal suffrage for Hong Kong that have been ringing out for decades but were particularly loudly voiced in the latter part of 2014.  An apparent work in progress that has been added to and updated since I viewed an earlier version of this cinematic labor of love last November (and may well be added to and updated again in the (near) future), it includes footage of protests in Tung Chung over the influx of Mainland Chinese daytrippers in the wake of the opening of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge last year and memorial events in honor of Liu Xiaobo held in Hong Kong in 2017 as well as from the 2016 Legislative Council swearing-in ceremony whose repercussions Hong Kong continues to feel, and the pro-democracy camp to reel from).

Whereas Evans Chan's 2016 coverage of the Umbrella Movement and its aftermath had concluded on a positive note, the thought-provoking We Have Boots may leave viewers sympathetic to the cause in two minds at best, and feeling down and at a loss at worst.  It's not just that, in picking up where Raising the Umbrellas left off, the filmmaker had to chronicle multiple setbacks for Hong Kong's political opposition, including the disqualification of a number of politicians who had been voted into the Legislative Council by thousands of voters in 2016 and also budding politicians seeking elected office (including Demosisto's Agnes Chow) and the conviction of a number of political activists (on charges that seem dubious or outright unfair).  

Rather, it's also how a number of Chan's interviewees, among them four members of what has come to be known as the Umbrella Nine, appear to envision their and Hong Kong's (near) future.  More specifically, there looks to be a sad acceptance that those seeking self-determination -- forget independence -- for Hong Kong are going to be rigidly opposed by the authorities and punished, including with years of imprisonment.  And while a number of these individuals feel it is their duty to press on regardless, their examples don't actually come across as all that massively inspiring any more.   

In view of their knowing -- not just fearing -- that political prosecution and persecution is in their future, it is perhaps only logical that their thoughts often tend to turn inwards and towards how to deal with the ordeals that they will be undergoing.  It also doesn't help that more and more paths seem to be closed to people seeking to agitate for a fairer deal for Hong Kong than Beijing is willing to give; this not least since, in delivering his verdict on the prosecution of the Umbrella Nine, presiding judge Johnny Chan has stated that civil disobedience is not a defence for a criminal charge. 

Amidst all this doom and gloom though, We Have Boots actually -- and rather surprisingly -- contains some moments of levity; with such as comments made during interviews with the likes of Alex Chow and Chan Kin Man getting viewers at the screening of the film that I attended chuckling and even laughing out loud.  Perhaps some of the jokes made can be seen as gallows humor but I'm also inclined to see hope for those who retain a sense of humor in the face of adversity -- and also seek to learn from trying experiences they expect to undergo.

The Nicki Giovanni poem that inspired this documentary work contains lines about laughing all through the storms that are bound to come.  Where Do You Enter concludes with the following lines:-

We have umbrellas

We have boots

We have each

other  

And it is true enough that there do remain a good number of people out there seeking genuine democracy from Hong Kong and who thus are not alone in their quest, however quixotic it may seem to be. 

My rating for the film: 7.0

Two more Li Lihua movies viewed at the 2019 Hong Kong International Film Festival (Film reviews)

Information panels found at screening venues when

the Hong Kong International Film Festival is taking place

The Flower Girl (Hong Kong, 1951)

- Part of the Hong Kong International Film Festival's Li Lihua: Four Treasures Restored program 

- Zhu Shilin, director

- Starring: Li Lihua, Han Fei, Wang Yuan Long, Jiang Ming, Liu Lian, etc.

In between the making and cinematic release of the first two films in the HKIFF's Li Lihua: Four Treasures Restored showcase that I viewed and the making and cinematic release of third offering starring Li Lihua at this year's fest that I viewed, Mainland China underwent a political revolution that saw it go from being the Republic of China ruled by the Kuomintang (Nationalist Party) to the People's Republic of China under the Communists.  These political upheavals north of the Mainland China-Hong Kong border resulted, among other things, in many people fleeing to, and re-settling in, Hong Kong -- including many leading lights of the Shanghai film industry such as this 1951 movie's director, producer (Fei Mu) and lead actress.

Set at a time when much of China was under Japanese military rule -- another tumultous (then) recent period of history which the cast and crew had personal experience of -- The Flower Girl is a Chinese adaptation of Boule de Suif, a well known Guy de Maupassant short story set during the Franco-Prussian War.  A party of disparate Chinese individuals journey from Shanghai one fateful day.  Already delayed by the coal-fueled truck breaking down at least once and going far slower than they would like, they then find themselves detained in the town they reached before the night curfew forbidding civilians to be on the road came into effect for an indefinite period of time as a result of one of their party having caught the eye of the area's Japanese military commander (Bai Shen).             

Identified early on in this emotional drama as a courtesan (a "nicer" term, like "flower girl", for prostitute), Hua Feng Hsien (Li Lihua) turns out to be a Chinese patriot and far more morally upright individual than the "higher class" members of her travelling party who initially trumpeted their outrage at her having been asked to go have sex with the covetous Japanese military officer but, then, for their own selfish reasons, put pressure on her to do just that.  A sub-plot involving a widow whose Chinese resistance fighter husband was killed by the Japanese further makes clear that people should be judged on their willingness to help others rather than their economic standing or social status. 

In recent years, there have been a number of Chinese language films set during the Second World War that appear to be geared towards unifying the Chinese by getting them to hate the Japanese.  However, the apparent pillars of the Chinese establishment who figure in the more dramatically complex The Flower Girl -- namely, a couple of businessman, a scholarly-looking patriarch and their wives -- come off looking almost as bad as the Japanese occupiers; an outcome that gets me thinking that Zhu Shilin and Co were making a statement that the bourgeoisie were to blame for the Communist revolution that threw China into further tumult after the end of the Second World War and resulted in many of their countrymen and -women's exile to Hong Kong, Taiwan and beyond. 

My rating for this film: 7.0 

Storm Over the Yangtze River (Taiwan, 1969)

- Part of the HKIFF's Li Lihua: Four Treasures Restored program

- Li Han Hsiang, director

- Starring: Peter Yang Kwan, Li Lihua, Ko Chun Hsiung

The evening after I viewed The Flower Girl, I saw another movie with Li Lihua as its female lead whose story takes place during the Second World War.  Still, there's no confusing these two works: filmed 18 years later than the earlier film, with a bigger budget (that, among other things, allowed for it to be lensed in color and feature action scenes with what appeared to be hundreds of extras) and shot in Taiwan, Storm Over the Yangtze River is as expansive in feel as the 1951 drama was often claustrophobically intimate. 

A spy-thriller with lots of intrigue and double agents, this ambitious effort's story can get rather confusing to follow -- especially if one doesn't quickly realize that there are four sides (Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalists), Chinese Communists, Chinese collaborators (with the Japanese) and the Japanese) trying to get the better of one another rather than just Chinese versus Japanese.  Adding to the complex web woven in this film is that the male protagonist -- who initially appears as a traitorous mercenary, only to turn out to be a heroic member of the resistance -- is seen having few qualms about sleeping with another woman even while he is a married man with a young son.

I have to be honest and admit that, with its plethora of sub-plots and slippery characters, it took me until around the half-way mark of this close-to-two-hour movie for things to start falling into place for me.  Once the pieces in the tale start to connect and make sense though, this film -- which tells the true story of an undercover intelligence agent code named Yangtze Number One -- turns out to be a pretty satisfying watch! 

Li Lihua is commanding as a Kuomintang intelligence unit head able to charm Chinese collaborators and resistance members alike.  Ko Chun Hsiung makes for a suitably handsome heroic resistance fighter.  But Peter Yang Kwan steals the show as the smooth fellow who many people -- not just this (re)viewer -- had trouble figuring which side he really was on; and it's not all that surprising to learn that he won the Golden Horse Best Actor prize for his work in this movie (and, for the record, Li Lihua also was named the Golden Horse Best Actress that year).   

My rating for this film: 7.0        

A political documentary about the contemporary U.S.A. and another on Vladimir Putin (Film reviews)

Gone but not forgotten...

Fahrenheit 11/9 (USA, 2018)

- Part of the Hong Kong International Film Festival's Cinephile Paradise program

- Michael Moore, director and scriptwriter

Seven days ago and four films ago, I viewed Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 11/9.  Prior to doing so, I had worried a bit that I'd fall asleep during its screening as it'd be my third at the Hong Kong International Film Festival that day.  Looking back, in doing so, I had forgotten the maverick documentary filmmaker's ability to entertain and evoking strong emotional reactions as well as inform and educate.

There's no question that the subjects that Fahrenheit 11/9 examines and the issues addressed in it are pretty serious ones.  We're talking, after all, of topics including money-driven elections, political corruption, gun control (or, rather, the lack of), lead poisoning, voter apathy, striking teachers and the rise of White nationalism.  At the same time, Michael Moore proceeds to present them in a film with segments that can -- and did -- make people smile, snigger and laugh out loud several times over the course of this two hour work (in addition to frown, groan and want to cry with frustration at other points during the screening).  

If truth be told, I'm not sure if many of my (liberal-leaning) American friends would react in the same manner to such as the opening scenes of this documentary that showed the widespread assumption prior to Donald Trump's shock win on November 9th, 2016, that Hillary Clinton would be elected President of the United States of America.  And therein might explain why it is that this documentary is among Michael Moore's lowest grossing films ever: for even while it's clear enough that the filmmaker is no fan of Donald Trump, it's readily apparent right from the first few minutes of this offering that he's got far more targets than just the man who is the USA's 45th president, and that they actually do include individuals on both sides of the country's political divide.

Also impressively diverse and varied are the topics that Michael Moore covers in Fahrenheit 11/9 and manages to weave together in a masterful polemic about American governance and politics that saw him spending time in places as far flung as Flint, Michigan (his city of birth) and West Virginia as well as Washington, D.C., and New York City.  More interested in understanding and making clear the conditions that led to the rise of Donald Trump and the ideologies he represents than solely throwing vitriol on him and his ilk, this is a film that Americans seeking to prevent their continued dominance would do well to view -- and it's a tragedy that it seems that many of them have, for some reason or other, opted against doing so.

My rating for this film: 8.5         

Putin's Witnesses (Latvia-Switzerland-Czech Republic, 2018)

- Part of the HKIFF's Reality Bites program

- Vitaly Mansky, director and concept

In the late hours of the last day of 1999, as the Russian people were getting ready to ring in a new year, there came an announcement by then President Boris Yeltsin that he would be stepping down from office.  Filmmaker Vitaly Mansky was at home in Moscow with his family when they heard the news -- and, in fact, in the middle of filming them for what presumably was a home video originally intended entirely for private consumption.  

Although reports had it that his approval rate was down to a mere two percent at the time, Yeltsin's shock announcement still upset Mansky's wife and the elder of his two young children.  On the other hand, it's not clear if his younger child was more upset with her father following her into the bathroom to continue filming her or the news that they had learnt via watching Yeltsin's 'live' TV appearance while Mansky himself didn't seem unduly perturbed by the news -- and appeared to have no qualms to subsequently take part in the filming of what appeared to be a pretty candid documentary portrait of the new Russian president in his first few months of political office and the lead-up to what turned out to be the first of several electoral victories that has seen him remain as the country's head of state since that fateful day close to 20 years ago now.

Among the things that can't cease to amaze when viewing Putin's Witnesses is how freely Mansky appeared able to film Vladimir Vladimorovich Putin.  (Indeed, in the short time that they appear on film, Mansky's family voiced more objections to having his camera on them than Putin looks to have done!)  Also pretty astounding is how unassuming the man we now know is perfectly comfortable wielding great power and firmly holding on to it appeared -- or, rather, took pains -- to be in early on during his presidency.  

A sign of how much things have changed in the intervening years can be seen in Mansky and his family now living in exile (in Latvia) and this film not being listed as a Russian (co-)production despite all of it having been filmed in the country whose head of state its primary subject is.  One reason for this is, as Mansky acknowledged in a post-screening Q&A, Putin appears to have changed so very much from what he had appeared to be like back in 2000.  Also worth noting though is how inadvertently -- and thus chillingly -- revealing the footage he shot back then (which includes that of Yeltsin and Mikhael Gorbachev post retirement and also a room full of then Putin advisors and aides, of whom -- rather disturbingly (and tellingly?) -- only one of them has remained in his political circle) can be close to two decades on.  

My rating for this film: 7.5

Two very different documentaries viewed on the same day at the Hong Kong International Film Festival (Film reviews)

Hong Kong International Film Festival collectibles 

on display and for sale during this year's fest

 

Still Recording (Syria-Lebanon-France-Germany-Qatar, 2018)

- Part of the Hong Kong International Film Festival's Documentary Competition program
- Saaed Al Batal and Ghiath Ayoub, co-directors, co-writers and co-cinematographers (the last with five others)

In 2011, two college students decided to move from Bashar al-Asaad-controlled Damascus to rebel-controlled Douma to take part in the still-ongoing Syrian Revolution.  Over the course of some four years, one of them, Saeed Al Batal, and his friends shot more than 450 hours of film footage documenting conflict, death and life in parts of the country under siege.  Mixed in too into what was ultimately edited into a 123-minute-length work were scenes shot in the Syrian capital -- in such as art studios and at a pool party -- which would normally seem commonplace but seemed rather surreal when viewed within the context of what else was shown going on in the same country at the time.

Going into a screening of Still Recording, I expected the documentary effort to be a tough watch -- and it did indeed turn out to be the case, but for different reasons than what I thought would be so.  For, yes, I was emotionally affected by the shots of people killed in the conflicts, many of them non-combatants, and their mass burials -- but I also felt physically ill after being exposed to so many real-life equivalents of "shaky cam" shots and not only had to close my eyes for extended periods during the film but also ended up downing some Ibuprofen seconds after the conclusion of its screening.

At the risk of sounding callous (not least since at least one person behind a camera lost his life over the course of the making of the work along with 13 other individuals known to the documentary's makers), I honestly thought that much of Still Recording was badly shot -- and got to wondering how terrible the discarded hours of recorded footage were in view of what passed muster to be included in the film.  In addition, the way that this guerilla documentary was put together made it so that confusion along with a sense of there having been so much tragic waste (of, but also in, people's lives) seems to be the key takeaway for a viewer like me (who was sincerely hoping for greater enlightenment about the Syrian conflict than this production provided me with).

Something else that I found out of note in Still Recording was how more socially liberal the Ba'athist-controlled parts of the country away from the main conflicts appeared to be.  Some might consider the scenes of partying young women and men in bathing suits drinking alcohol -- and having fun while parts of the country burnt -- to be decadent and indulgent.  But I have a feeling that many of these same people also would be disturbed by the religious fervor of the rebels that can be seen not only in their constant invocations of "Allah" in battle but also at other times, the more conservative clothing of their womenfolk (none of whom, more than incidentally, are shown as active participants in the conflict) and their destruction of hundreds of bottles of alcohol that one of the rebels can later be heard lamenting as a waste off camera!

My rating for this film: 4.0   

Free Solo (USA, 2018) 
Part of the HKIFF's Cinephile Paradise program
- Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, co-directors and co-producers (the latter with two others)

The Hong Kong Cultural Centre's over 1,700-capacity Grand Theatre is my favorite film viewing venue in Hong Kong; with memorable viewing experiences there including those for Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago.  So it was rather disappointing to discover that I'd only be attending one HKIFF screening there this year.  Still, if I had to pick one film from this year's HKIFF viewing selection to do so on a mega-big screen with more than a thousand other appreciative audience members, then the visually astounding Free Solo really would have been it!

Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin deserve credit for taking the time and effort to show the often amusing as well as interesting human side of professional rock climber Alex Honnold.  Still, there's no doubt that Free Solo soars highest when documenting the free solo enthusiast's superhuman attempt(s) to climb a 3,000 foot vertical rock formation known as El Capitan without ropes or other safety gear.   

As should be obvious, doing all this with the help of others and when using safety equipment already constitutes quite the feat.  But doing it alone with chalk being the most visible equipment besides one one's hands, arms, body, brain, legs and feet, and with the pressure of having the possibly fatal activity being recorded by a camera team composed of fellow climbing enthusiasts cum friends, surely required the kind of psychological as well as physical abilities that very few humans possess.

There's no question about it: Alex Honnold is the star of this amazing show -- with his girlfriend Sanni McCandless often not coming off that screen, to the extent that many members of the audience probably were willing for him to dump her way before the end of the film!  At the same time though, it also should be recognized that the makers of Free Solo -- notably its camera crew -- really did do a great job too.  Visually stunning, beautiful and spectacular, this deserved Academy Award-winning documentary also has a good amount of dramatic tension, with many of its most suspenseful sections causing my palms to sweat (truly!), and the very audible collective gasps of shock, surprise and relief emanating from the audience at various parts of the screening making the viewing of this film an incredibly enjoyable film fest experience. 
 
My rating for this film: 9.0

No regrets re watching First Night Nerves at Hong Kong City Hall! (film review)

At the first ever screening of First Night Nerves 

at Hong Kong City

 

Close-up shot of director Stanley Kwan (on the left)

and scriptwriter Jimmy Ngai

First Night Nerves (Hong Kong-Mainland China, 2018)

- Part of the Hong Kong International Film Festival's Gala Presentation program

- Stanley Kwan, director

- Starring: Sammi Cheng, Gigi Leung, Bai Baihe, Kam Kwok Leung, Angie Chiu, Catherine Chau, Qi Xi, Kiki Sheung 

 

After it had its world premiere at the Busan International Film Festival in October last year, I eagerly looked forward to checking out Hong Kong auteur Stanley Kwan's first feature length Hong Kong work since 2005's Everlasting Regret in his home city.  What with my not having gotten any word of a cinematic release for First Night Nerves in the months afterwards, I worried that there was a problem with the movie until I saw it appear in the 43rd Hong Kong International Film Festival's Gala Presentation program -- with screenings at the over 1,700-seater Grand Theatre of the Hong Kong Cultural Centre and the venue where much of the film takes place: Hong Kong City Hall.  

In an interview published by the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society, Stanley Kwan shared that: "A couple of years ago the Hong Kong government suggested demolishing City Hall.  A lot of people were against the idea and of course the plan was called off.  But the news reminded me of the many times I'd used the building -- going to film festivals, seeing stage plays and concerts -- so I told my scriptwriter [Jimmy Ngai] that it might be interesting to come up with a story set in and around City Hall, using the place itself as a background and filling it with colorful characters"; with the highly entertaining cinematic offering that came out of it being the one that I was in the audience at Hong Kong City Hall to see one evening last week.

 

A female-dominated work whose Chinese title roughly translates into English as "eight women, one stage", First Night Nerves stars two luminaries of music and screen as thespians appearing together on stage in a period melodrama about two estranged sisters.  Sammi Cheng is Xiuling, a once shining star making a reluctant return to acting in the wake of the death of her husband in a play produced by her wealthy sister-in-law (Angie Chiu), while Gigi Leung plays Yuwen, a glamorous younger actress secretly intimidated by having to share the limelight with Xiuling as well as regularly put off by the criticisms that the play's director (Kam Kwok Leung) throws her way as well as by the helmer's eccentric ways.

 

Set in the week leading up to their play's opening night, First Night Nerves also features Bai Baihe (described by Stanley Kwan in the post-screening Q&A as the Meg Ryan of China) in an atypical role as Fusha, a super rich lesbian who has been a fan of Xiuling's ever since she was a child; Catherine Chau as Yuwen's personal assistant cum long-time friend, Yilian; Qi Xi as Nini, Xiuling's personal assistant cum confidant, who also happens to be a relation of Fusha; and veteran actress Kiki Sheung as the City Hall general manager who is up on the latest celebrity gossip and thus has quite a bit of knowledge along with definite views about certain of the personalities who are literally in her space for a time.

 

A multi-layered ensemble drama-comedy which is full of local references and entertainment industry in-jokes, First Night Nerves is one of those works that will be a particularly fun watch for audience members who are "in the know", or at least sufficiently clued in to realize that certain seemingly improbable occurrences in the film (such as a billionaire offering a fortune to the man who can win the heart of a lesbian relation) actually were inspired by real life events that took place here in Hong Kong.  Often over-the-top in a way that accentuates its comedy quotient, it looks to be Stanley Kwan's funniest and most enjoyable film in years, if not ever.      

 

At the same time, however, this is an offering with lots of points to make and messages to deliver.  While there's no fear of it getting untolerably pedantic, First Night Nerves does require its audience to be open minded enough to accept -- and like -- its characters, who have quite the range of personalities and also sexual identities.  My sense is that even if one initially isn't, Jimmy Ngai's smart and sassy script -- which gives more than one supporting character in this film more complexity, dimensions and cool moments than is found in many other works' protagonists -- still will entertain you for much of the movie, if not win you over by its conclusion.

 

My rating for the film: 8.5