Tales from the Dark 1
Tales from the Dark 1 is a 2013 Hong Kong portmanteau horror film directed by Simon Yam, Lee Chi-ngai, Fruit Chan. The film is split into three stories based on short stories by Lilian Lee; the first film is titled Stolen Goods directed by and stars Simon Yam as a man in Hong Kong who has lost his job and decides to make money by stealing funeral urns and blackmailing the families into buying them back from him. The second story is titled A Word in the Palm; the film is about a fortune teller played by Tony Leung Ka-fai, who retired from his job to study music, but retains the ability to see ghosts. The final film is titled Jing Zhe; the film stars Josephine Koo, asked to beat up an unusual woman to beat up an entire group of strangers. The film marked the first director work of actor Simon Yam, it was shown at the New York Asian Film Festival on 28 June 2013. The film was released theatrically in Hong Kong on 11 July 2013; the film was followed up with Tales from the Dark 2, released in 2013. The film's story was adapted from the second book in Lilian Lee's five-volume book series that were published in newspaper form.
The film's directors included Fruit Chan and Lee Chi-ngai who have not directed many films in the past decade and Simon Yam who made his directorial debut with this film. Derek Elley of Film Business Asia described the film as a "portmanteau horror film" and felt it was similar in tone and style to 1980s and early 1990s Hong Kong horror films; the Hollywood Reporter echoed this statement, referring to it as a "film that harkens back to the glory days of Hong Kong horror in the 1980s." Tales from the Dark 1 was the opening night film at the New York Asian Film Festival on 28 June 2013. It was released theatrically in Hong Kong on 11 July 2013; the film was followed-up with a sequel titled Tales from the Dark 2 released on 8 August 2013. Variety gave the film a mixed review, stating that "this somewhat uneven but engrossing mini-triptych should please fans of Asian horror without scaring their pants off"; the Hollywood Reporter referred to the film as a "mostly engaging film" and that "Anthologies are by definition hit and miss endeavors and swing wildly in quality from one segment to the next.
That’s what happens here, except the producers have wisely managed to bottom load the film so that sitting through the first entry pays off." Tales from the Dark 1 on IMDb
Incest
Incest is human sexual activity between family members or close relatives. This includes sexual activity between people in consanguinity, sometimes those related by affinity, clan, or lineage; the incest taboo is one of the most widespread of all cultural taboos, both in present and in past societies. Most modern societies have laws regarding incest or social restrictions on consanguineous marriages. In societies where it is illegal, consensual adult incest is seen by some as a victimless crime; some cultures extend the incest taboo to relatives with no consanguinity such as milk-siblings, step-siblings, adoptive siblings, albeit sometimes with less intensity. Third-degree relatives on average share 12.5% genes, sexual relations between them are viewed differently in various cultures, from being discouraged to being acceptable. Children of incestuous relationships have been regarded as illegitimate, are still so regarded in some societies today. In most cases, the parents did not have the option to marry to remove that status, as incestuous marriages were, are also prohibited.
A common justification for prohibiting incest is avoiding inbreeding: a collection of genetic disorders suffered by the children of parents with a close genetic relationship. Such children are at greater risk for congenital disorders and developmental and physical disability, that risk is proportional to their parents' coefficient of relationship—a measure of how the parents are related genetically, but cultural anthropologists have noted that inbreeding avoidance cannot form the sole basis for the incest taboo because the boundaries of the incest prohibition vary between cultures, not in ways that maximize the avoidance of inbreeding. In some societies, such as those of Ancient Egypt, brother–sister, father–daughter, mother–son, cousin–cousin, aunt–nephew, uncle–niece, other combinations of relations within a royal family were married as a means of perpetuating the royal lineage; some societies, such as the Balinese and some Inuit tribes, have different views about what constitutes illegal and immoral incest.
However, sexual relations with a first-degree relative are universally forbidden. The English word incest is derived from the Latin incestus, which has a general meaning of "impure, unchaste", it was introduced into Middle English, both in the generic Latin sense and in the narrow modern sense. The derived adjective incestuous appears in the 16th century. Before the Latin term came in, incest was known in Old English as sib-leger or mǣġhǣmed but in time, both words fell out of use. Terms like incester and incestual have been used to describe those interested or involved in sexual relations with relatives among humans, while inbreeder has been used in relation to similar behavior among non-human animals or organisms. Other words that describe sexual attraction to relatives include consanguinophilia, synegenesophilia and incestophilia. In ancient China, first cousins with the same surnames were not permitted to marry, while those with different surnames were. Several of the Egyptian Pharaohs had several children with them.
For example, Tutankhamun married his half-sister Ankhesenamun, was himself the child of an incestuous union between Akhenaten and an unidentified sister-wife. It is now accepted that sibling marriages were widespread among all classes in Egypt during the Graeco-Roman period. Numerous papyri and the Roman census declarations attest to many husbands and wives being brother and sister, of the same father and mother; the most famous of these relationships were in the Ptolemaic royal family. The fable of Oedipus, with a theme of inadvertent incest between a mother and son, ends in disaster and shows ancient taboos against incest as Oedipus is punished for incestuous actions by blinding himself. In the "sequel" to Oedipus, his four children are punished for their parents' incestuousness. Incest appears in the accepted version of the birth of Adonis, when his mother, Myrrha has sex with her father Cinyras during a festival, disguised as a prostitute. In Ancient Greece, Spartan King Leonidas I, hero of the legendary Battle of Thermopylae, was married to his niece Gorgo, daughter of his half-brother Cleomenes I.
Greek law allowed marriage between a sister if they had different mothers. For example, some accounts say. Incest is mentioned and condemned in Virgil's Aeneid Book VI: hic thalamum invasit natae vetitosque hymenaeos. Roman civil law prohibited marriages within four degrees of consanguinity but had no degrees of affinity with regards to marriage. Roman civil laws prohibited any marriage between parents and children, either in the ascending or descending line ad infinitum. Adoption was considered the same as affinity in that an adoptive father could not marry an unemancipated daughter or granddaughter if the adoption had been dissolved. Incestuous unions were considered nefas in ancient Rome. In AD 295 incest was explicitly forbidden by an imperial edict, which divided
Cantonese
Cantonese is a variety of Chinese spoken in the city of Guangzhou and its surrounding area in Southeastern China. It is the traditional prestige variety and standard form of Yue Chinese, one of the major subgroups of Chinese. In mainland China, it is the lingua franca of the province of Guangdong and neighbouring areas such as Guangxi, it is the official language of Hong Kong and Macau. Cantonese is widely spoken amongst Overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia and throughout the Western world. While the term Cantonese refers to the prestige variety, it is used in a broader sense for the entire Yue subgroup of Chinese, including related but mutually unintelligible languages and dialects such as Taishanese; when Cantonese and the related Yuehai dialects are classified together, there are about 80 million total speakers. Cantonese is viewed as a vital and inseparable part of the cultural identity for its native speakers across large swaths of Southeastern China, Hong Kong and Macau, as well as in overseas communities.
Although Cantonese shares a lot of vocabulary with Mandarin, the two varieties are mutually unintelligible because of differences in pronunciation and lexicon. Sentence structure, in particular the placement of verbs, sometimes differs between the two varieties. A notable difference between Cantonese and Mandarin is; this results in the situation in which a Cantonese and a Mandarin text may look similar but are pronounced differently. In English, the term "Cantonese" can be ambiguous. Cantonese proper is the variety native to the city of Canton, the traditional English name of Guangzhou; this narrow sense may be specified as "Canton language" or "Guangzhou language". However, "Cantonese" may refer to the primary branch of Chinese that contains Cantonese proper as well as Taishanese and Gaoyang. In this article, "Cantonese" is used for Cantonese proper. Speakers called this variety "Canton speech" or "Guangzhou speech", although this term is now used outside Guangzhou. In Guangdong and Guangxi, people call it "provincial capital speech" or "plain speech".
Academically called "Canton prefecture speech". In Hong Kong and Macau, as well as among overseas Chinese communities, the language is referred to as "Guangdong speech" or "Canton Province speech", or as "Chinese". In mainland China, the term "Guangdong speech" is increasingly being used amongst both native and non-native speakers. Given the history of the development of the Yue languages and dialects during the Tang dynasty migrations to the region, in overseas Chinese communities, it is referred to as "Tang speech", given that the Cantonese people refer to themselves as "people of Tang". Due to its status as a prestige dialect among all the dialects of the Yue branch of Chinese varieties, it is called "Standard Cantonese"; the official languages of Hong Kong are English, as defined in the Hong Kong Basic Law. The Chinese language has many different varieties. Given the traditional predominance of Cantonese within Hong Kong, it is the de facto official spoken form of the Chinese language used in the Hong Kong Government and all courts and tribunals.
It is used as the medium of instruction in schools, alongside English. A similar situation exists in neighboring Macau, where Chinese is an official language alongside Portuguese; as in Hong Kong, Cantonese is the predominant spoken variety of Chinese used in everyday life and is thus the official form of Chinese used in the government. The Cantonese spoken in Hong Kong and Macau is mutually intelligible with the Cantonese spoken in the mainland city of Guangzhou, although there exist some minor differences in accent and vocabulary. Cantonese first developed around the port city of Guangzhou in the Pearl River Delta region of southeastern China. Due to the city's long standing as an important cultural center, Cantonese emerged as the prestige dialect of the Yue varieties of Chinese in the Southern Song dynasty and its usage spread around most of what is now the provinces of Guangdong and Guangxi. Despite the cession of Macau to Portugal in 1557 and Hong Kong to Britain in 1842, the ethnic Chinese population of the two territories originated from the 19th and 20th century immigration from Guangzhou and surrounding areas, making Cantonese the predominant Chinese language in the territories.
On the mainland, Cantonese continued to serve as the lingua franca of Guangdong and Guangxi provinces after Mandarin was made the official language of the government by the Qing dynasty in the early 1900s. Cantonese remained a dominant and influential language in southeastern China until the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949 and its promotion of Standard Chinese as the sole official language of the nation throughout the last half of the 20th century, although its influence still remains strong within the region. While the Chinese government vehemently discourages the official use of all forms of Chinese except Standard Chinese, Cantonese enjoys a higher standing than other Chinese langua
Hong Kong motion picture rating system
The Hong Kong motion picture rating system is a legal system of movie screening and rating. An official government agency issues ratings for any movie. At the beginning of the film industry in Hong Kong, when the viewing of movies had no age restrictions, films were made under strict guidelines. For instance, movie characters were not allowed to get away with crimes, sex scenes were not permitted. In 1986, with the release of John Woo's violent gangster movie A Better Tomorrow, the general public became concerned about the influence films had on children; as a result, the Hong Kong motion picture rating system was established under the Movie Screening Ordinance Cap.392 on 10 November 1988. The purpose behind the law was to provide parents of minors a chance to prevent their children from being exposed to inappropriate materials, as well as to allow people to watch movies with content aimed towards adults; the ratings were issued by the Television and Entertainment Licensing Authority, provided three levels of ratings, which led the slang term "three-tier ratings" to popular usage.
In 1995, the ratings were amended, creating three levels of main ratings, two sub-ratings for one level. According to the laws of Hong Kong, any movies that are intended to be shown in Hong Kong cinemas or released to the public via any videotape or disc formats must be screened by the Office for Film and Article Administration; the Office will permit the movie to be released under their assessed level rating. Movie trailers intended to be shown inside the cinema hall or in cinema lobbies must be submitted for classification. Only still films exhibited. If a movie is rated as a Third Level film, its promotional materials must be screened by the Office for Film and Article Administration. In addition, any videotape or discs that will be sold must be sealed by plastic bagging before it can be sold; the Board of Review consists of nine other persons who are not public officers. Members act as review submitted films for classification. Film distributors or any person who disagrees with the censors may request the Board to review that decision.
Under the Film Censorship Ordinance, the Film Censorship Authority may appoint persons to be film censorship advisers as needed for a one-year term. Once every two weeks, panel members are invited to preview films along with the censors and provide their views on film classification; the panel of advisers has 300 members, including teachers, social workers, professionals and college students. Of the four levels, Levels I, IIA, IIB are advisory ratings only, carry no legal effect. Only Level III forbid a certain portion of the population from watching the film. Ticket sellers in movie theatres have a legal right to check the identity of a person who wishes to watch a Level III film to ensure legal compliance; every two years, TELA commissions an independent research company to conduct a large-scale survey to collect the public's views on the film classification system and the film classification standards. In 2000, a survey was conducted on 617 members of the public, aged 13 to 59 years old. In addition, supplementary surveys were conducted on 108 members on the panel of advisers and 472 moviegoers.
The survey findings were that all respondents were aware the classification system was in place, 59% could identify the current system, as well as its symbols and their meanings. Findings of a survey conducted from 2010 to 2011 revealed that there is general community support of the existing film classification system and its standards. Sévéon, Julien. Catégorie III: sexe, sang et politique à Hong Kong. Paris: Bazaar & Co. ISBN 978-2-917339-03-9. List of Hong Kong Category III films Comparison of Film Ratings between Hong Kong and Other Countries Office for Film and Article Administration Film Search
Made in Hong Kong (film)
Made in Hong Kong is a 1997 Hong Kong drama film written and directed by Fruit Chan, executive produced and produced by Andy Lau and starring Sam Lee, Yim Hui-Chi, Wenders Li, Tam Ka-Chuen. It won the Best Picture Award at the 1998 Hong Kong Film Awards along with 13 other wins and 6 nominations; the film was selected as the Hong Kong entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 71st Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee. Much of the film is set in subsidised housing projects, which Chan considered to be'a Hong Kong thing' due to the high population density of the region. Though the film is sometimes regarded as a response to the 1997 Hong Kong handover, Chan feels that Made in Hong Kong can be viewed as a character-driven drama that reflects the lifestyle of many young Hong Kong people at the time; the film is made from leftover film reels and as such has a low cost of production for an independent movie. Sam Lee - To Chung-Chau,'Moon' Neiky Yim Hui-Chi - Lam Yuk-Ping,'Ping' Wenders Li - Ah-Lung,'Sylvester' Amy Tam Ka-Chuen - Hui Bo San,'Susan' Carol Lam Kit-Fong - Mrs. Lam, Ping's mother Doris Chow Yan-Wah - Mrs. To, Moon's mother Siu Chung - Ms. Lee, social worker Chan Tat-Yee - Fat Chan Wu Wai-Chung - Keung Sang Chan -'Big Brother', Cheung Siu-Wing Kelvin Chung - Doctor Ah Ting - Moon's father Jessica - Moon's father's current wife Ah Wai - Assassin on skateboard Ho B-Chai - Male student List of submissions to the 71st Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film List of Hong Kong submissions for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film Made in Hong Kong on IMDb Made in Hong Kong Review at BBC FOUR
Peak Tram
The Peak Tram is a funicular railway in Hong Kong, which carries both tourists and residents to the upper levels of Hong Kong Island. Running from Garden Road Admiralty to Victoria Peak via the Mid-Levels, it provides the most direct route and offers good views over the harbour and skyscrapers of Hong Kong; the Peak Tram is owned and operated by Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels, the owner of Hong Kong's famous Peninsula Hotel along with many other properties. The line, along with HSH's Peak Tower leisure complex at the line's summit, is promoted using the brand The Peak; the Peak Tram's route from Central district to Victoria Peak covers a distance of about 1.4 kilometres and an elevation of just under 400 metres. The line has two pronounced curves, one to the left after leaving the lower terminus, the other to the right in the upper half of the ascent; the gradient varies throughout the ascent. It is a passing loop, with two trams; the lower terminus station, Garden Road, is located on Garden Road near St. John's Cathedral.
The original station was incorporated into St. John's Building, an office tower, with the tram terminus at the ground level; the station comprises a single track, with platforms on both sides. One platform is used for the other for exiting the tram; the upper terminus, The Peak, is located below the Peak Tower shopping and leisure complex at Victoria Gap, some 150 meters below the summit of Victoria Peak. The station has the same arrangement of alighting platforms as the lower terminus; the haulage and control equipment for the funicular is located in a basement below the station. There are four intermediate stops, each of, a request stop consisting of a single stepped platform and a shelter: Kennedy Road. Located on Kennedy Road, named after Arthur Edward Kennedy, a former Governor of Hong Kong. MacDonnell Road. Located on MacDonnell Road, named after Richard Graves MacDonnell, a former Governor of Hong Kong. May Road. Located on May Road, named after Francis Henry May, a former Governor of Hong Kong.
Barker Road. Located on Barker Road, named after George Digby Barker, a former military commander and acting administrator of Hong Kong. In 1881 Alexander Findlay Smith first put the project of a Peak Railway into shape and presented a petition for a concession to the governor of Hong Kong; the necessary legislation was passed two years later. Findlay Smith did not approach the project rashly. Travelling extensively in Europe and America, he made himself conversant with nearly every existing method of railway employed for mountain ascent — San Francisco, Rigi, Lucerne, the Rhine, Mount Vesuvius — and returned to Hong Kong convinced of the feasibility of his idea; the actual construction was begun in September 1885 and in May 1888 the line was opened. Smith's business partner, N. J. Ede and lived in the house next to the Upper Terminus named Dunheved, which they converted into the original Peak Hotel, it took three years to build the Peak Tram. Most of the heavy equipment and rails needed for the construction were hauled uphill by the workers with no mechanical support.
As a revolutionary new form of transport for Asia at the time, the tramway was considered a marvel of engineering upon its completion. A wooden structure was built for the terminal. According to photographs, the Garden Road terminus was an unadorned building, a large clock face was added to the edifice between the 1910s and 1920s; the Peak Tram was opened for public service on 28 May 1888 by the governor Sir George William des Voeux. As built, the line used a static steam engine to power the haulage cable, it was at first used only for residents of Victoria Peak. Despite that, it carried 800 passengers on its first day of operation, about 150,000 in its first year, transported in the line's original wooden-bodied cars; the tram's existence accelerated the residential development of the Mid Levels. From its opening in 1888 until 1926, the Peak Tram divided into three classes: First Class: British colonial officials and residents of Victoria Peak Second Class: British military and the Hong Kong Police Force personnel Third Class: Other people and animalsThe initial round trip charges, HKD 30 cents, 20 cents and 10 cents, had risen 50 per cent by 1926.
From 1908 to 1949, the first two seats in the front of the tram were reserved for the governor of Hong Kong, to, attached a bronze plaque reading: "This seat is reserved for His Excellency the Governor". The seats were not available to ordinary passengers until two minutes before departure. In the course of its history, the tram has been a victim of two natural disasters, caused by floods from heavy rainfall, which washed away steep sections of the track between Bowen Road and Kennedy Road; the first was in 1899, the second occurred on 12 June 1966. In 1926, the steam engine was replaced by an electric motor. On 11 December 1941, during the Battle of Hong Kong, the engine room was damaged in an attack. Services were not resumed until 25 December 1945, after the end of the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong. In 1956, the Peak Tram was equipped with a new generation of lightweight metal-bodied cars, each of which seated 62 passengers. Unusually for a funicular line, three such cars were provided, only two of which were in use at any one time.
The third spare car was kept in a car shed near Kennedy Road station. The system was comprehensively rebuilt in 1989 by the Swiss company, Von Roll, with a new track, a computerized control system, two new two-car trams with a capacity of 120 passe
Christopher Doyle
Christopher Doyle known as Dù Kěfēng or Dou Ho-Fung is an Australian-Hong Kong cinematographer. He has worked on over fifty Chinese-language films, being best known for his collaborations with Wong Kar-Wai in Chungking Express, Happy Together, In the Mood for Love and 2046. Doyle is known for other films such as Temptress Moon, Hero and Psycho, he has won awards at the Cannes Film Festival and Venice Film Festival, as well as AFI Award for cinematography, the Golden Horse awards, Hong Kong Film Award. Doyle was born in Sydney, Australia in 1952, he left his native country on a Norwegian merchant ship at the age of eighteen. While living in other countries, he took on several odd jobs, such as an oil driller in India, a cow herder in Israel, a doctor of Chinese medicine in Thailand. In the late seventies, Doyle took an interest in Chinese culture, received the Chinese name Dù Kěfēng, which translates to “like the wind.” Following his time as a language student in Taiwan, he started working professionally as a photographer.
A couple of years he became a cinematographer, working with director Edward Yang in the 1983 film That Day, on the Beach. Doyle has worked on over fifty Chinese-language films, he is best known for his collaborations with Wong Kar-Wai in Chungking Express, Happy Together, In the Mood for Love and 2046. He has collaborated with other Chinese filmmakers on projects including Temptress Moon and Dumplings, he has made more than twenty films in various other languages, working as director of photography on Gus Van Sant's remake of Psycho, Liberty Heights, Last Life in the Universe, Rabbit-Proof Fence, Paranoid Park, The Limits of Control, amongst others. He wrote and directed Warsaw Dark, Away with Words starring Asano Tadanobu, Hong Kong Trilogy: Preschooled Preoccupied Preposterous, an experimental portrait of three generations of Hong Kong people, he most co-directed The White Girl with Jenny Suen. On May 26, 2017 Doyle was honored during the 70th Cannes Festival with the “Pierre Angénieux ExcelLens in Cinematography” award, in tribute to his successful and influential career.
The ceremony was co-hosted by filmmaker Olivier Assayas, actress Juliette Binoche, director Jenny Suen, among others. Among Doyle's sixty awards and thirty nominations are the Technical Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival for In the Mood for Love, as well as the Osella d’Oro for Best Cinematography for Ashes of Time at the Venice International Film Festival. Away with Words Izolator aka "Warsaw Dark" Hong Kong Trilogy: Preschooled Preoccupied Preposterous The White Girl, co-directed with Jenny Suen Home / Movie Paris, je t'aime – segment "Porte de Choisy" Dumbass on YouTube – musicvideo with lyrics by Ai Weiwei, music by Zuoxiao Zuzhou Angel Talk – Behind the scenes photo book covering Fallen Angels – ISBN 978-4-7952-8069-4 Backlit by the Moon – Japanese photography monograph – ISBN 978-4-947648-39-6 Photographs of Tamaki Ogawa – Japanese photography monograph – ISBN 978-4-947599-45-2 Doyle on Doyle – Japanese photography monograph – ISBN 4-9900557-1-3 Buenos Aires – Behind the scenes photo book covering Happy Together – ISBN 978-4-7952-8066-3 Don't Cry for Me, Argentina – Photographic journal account of filming Happy Together – ISBN 962-8114-24-7 A Cloud in Trousers – Gallery exhibition monograph – ISBN 978-1-889195-33-9 There Is a Crack in Everything – Photography monograph R34g38b25 – Behind the scenes photo book covering Hero – ISBN 978-962-86177-0-8 Talking White - Behind-the-scenes photobook covering The White Girl Cinema of Hong Kong Christopher Doyle Official Site Christopher Doyle on IMDb “The Legend of Drunken Master,” Dennis Lim of The Village Voice interviews Christopher Doyle, 6 August 2004.
‘If you call me, you know what you’re in for,’ The Guardian's Steve Rose interviews Christopher Doyle, 7 January 2005. Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3, interview with Christopher Doyle in three parts by Andreas Pousette, February 2005. ‘His eyes have seen the glory...’ The Guardian's Gaby Wood interviews Christopher Doyle, 17 July 2005. Video: Christopher Doyle talks about Hong Kong for CNN and Nokia’s feature series “The Scene.” Text of CNN interview with Christopher Doyle
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