Sam Ho Presents: Negotiating Modernity–Mainland China and Hong Kong | Between Mainland China and Hong Kong #3
From Beijing with Love (1994), directed by Stephen Chow, Lee Lik-Chi
Wednesday April 17, 7:30pm
Venue: CCT Theater
Speaker: Sam Ho何思穎, Hong Kong SAR of China & US Based Curator, Researcher, and Writer
*This event is organized by CSCC and the China Stories and Images Cluster, co-sponsored by the DKU Film Society and DKU Student Movie Club.
About From Beijing with Love: After a giant dinosaur skull is stolen, the head of the Chinese secret police decides to assign the case to the force’s most incompetent reject: a rural butcher who stands around all day drinking martinis (shaken, not stirred). With a trunkload of insanely useless gadgets and a contact who constantly tries to kill him, the young agent must locate the skull and find out just what is going on here. (-Letterboxd)
About the Series
Film is one of the most important forms of expression of our time. A largely commercial enterprise constantly seeking connections with the mass audience, it is a medium through which key concerns of the people are negotiated. It is also a medium of artistic expression, with powerful capacity for inspiration and emotional resonance.
This program aims at examining several important issues that concern modern day China through the screening of films. It will consist of nine screenings, most of them made in Hong Kong, each followed by a lecture and discussion. Highly business oriented, Hong Kong films often exercise interactions with the public through market mechanisms, addressing cultural, social and historical issues in meaningful ways.
The nine screenings will be presented through three themes, each dealing with a different aspect of modern life and how it relates to the Chinese people.
The first theme, titled “Between City and Village,” focuses on the relationship between urban and rural sensibilities in modern times, manifested in alternately conflicting and harmonious ways.
“Between Men and Women” is the title of the second theme, which examines gender issues, on the way changing relationship between men and women in Hong Kong are captured on film by the informal negotiations conducted through the medium’s commercial enterprises.
“Between Mainland China and Hong Kong,” the third theme, looks at the relationship between Mainland China and Hong Kong as depicted by Hong Kong filmmakers during the colonial era.
About the Curator, Sam Ho何思穎
Sam Ho何思穎 is a curator, researcher, and writer. Based in Hong Kong SAR and the United States, he specializes in the study of Hong Kong cinema but has also written extensively on various aspects of cinema while also curating dozens of programs on various aspects of international cinema. Devoted to the international promotion of Hong Kong cinema, he has given many lectures and speeches all over the world.
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