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Transitions from small-screen video-makers to big-screen filmmakers have been a pattern since the dawn of MTV, as though it is natural. It is inevitable that online video-makers, like Trevor Choi and his 16by9 production, would choose the same path. Big in Hong Kong, 16by9 launched their crowdfunding campaign for the Frank project in 2022 and have since faced challenges such as casting changes and several creative and financial overhauls. The end result is nothing short of remarkable. But they seem to carry over some elements of their online content to their feature, which may sometimes be questionable.

Smashing Frank by Trevor Choi is screening at New York Asian Film Festival

Set in a fictional Hong Kong where religion gets entangled with power, a gang of youth thieves who leave behind graffiti of the word “Frank” starts attacking money lenders and jewelry stores. Frank threatens the powerful through their online videos, and their audience cheers for them.

A detective thriller draped in marital drama, Behind the Shadows unfolds amid Kuala Lumpur’s humid streets and dimly lit backrooms. Au Yeung Wai-yip (Louis Koo) operates a smoke-filled Pi agency, hired to expose unfaithful partners—only to discover his own wife, Kuan Weng Sam (Chrissie Chau), at the heart of his latest adultery case. Co-directors Jonathan Li and Chou Man-yu, reunited after Dust to Dust, steer clear of pure puzzle-solving in favor of the intimate fissures beneath each revelation.

The film’s pulse alternates between furtive stakeouts and charged domestic confrontations, its humid atmosphere and shifting loyalties setting a tone of relentless unease. As an exploration of trust and betrayal, the story pivots on that first tremor—Au’s dawning realization that professional detachment cannot shield him from personal upheaval.

Unraveling Threads

Three distinct assignments kick off the narrative: a missing-person inquiry, a gangster’s suspicion of his moll,...

Lawrence Kan’s newsroom drama In Broad Daylight leads the pack going into the 42nd Hong Kong Film Awards with 16 nominations.

The feature, which follows an undercover journalist who exposes the abuse of residents in a nursing home, secured nods in all but three of the 19 categories. It marks the second feature by Kan and proved the fourth highest grossing local film in 2023.

Scroll down for full list of nominations

Also gaining multiple nominations was Nick Cheuk’s emotive drama Time Still Turns The Pages and Felix Chong’s financial crime extravaganza The Goldfinger, which secured 12 nods apiece, while Jack Ng...

In a moment of irresponsible negligence, sharp-tongued barrister Adrian Lam (Dayo Wong) mishandles a child abuse case and indirectly sentences the innocent Jolene Tsang (Louise Wong) to prison for 17 years. Falling from disgrace, Adrian decides to serve the public and defend the commoners, until an unlikely opportunity for appeal surfaces. Determined to right his wrong, Adrian gathers former partners Evelyn Fong (Renci Yeung) and Prince (Ho Kai Wa) to free Jolene, but that would mean fighting against the tycoons, Victoria (Fish Liew) and Desmond Chung (Adam Pak), who also have barrister James Tung (Michael Wong) as their private consultant. With pressure from media and police, and facing tough cross examination from prosecutor Kam Yuen Shan (Tse Kwan Ho) in court, how will Adrian uphold justice and punish the true culprit?...

The treatment of sapphic love in films could be an uncomfortable toss-up between tragedy and bliss, but “The First Girl I Loved” does neither of these. Co-directed by Candy Ng Wing-shan and Chiu Hoi Yeung, the entry to the 2021 Hong Kong Asian Film Festival and 2022 Osaka Asian Film Festival instead explores the liminal space between the two, where love simply evolves and is not punctuated by anything.

“The First Girl I Loved” is screening at Udine Far East Film Festival

The film tells the story of Lee Wing Nam and Sylvia Lee Sum Yuet and how their romance blossoms in a Catholic all-girls school in Hong Kong during their youth, only to see its certitude challenged as they slowly enter the realm of adulthood. The hurdles to their love first come in the form of institutions, with restrictions and rules imposed by an educational system defined by dogma. Wing and...

The treatment of sapphic love in films could be an uncomfortable toss-up between tragedy and bliss, but “The First Girl I Loved” does neither of these. Co-directed by Candy Ng Wing-shan and Chiu Hoi Yeung, the entry to the 2021 Hong Kong Asian Film Festival and 2022 Osaka Asian Film Festival instead explores the liminal space between the two, where love simply evolves and is not punctuated by anything.

“The First Girl I Loved” is screening at Osaka Asian Film Festival

The film tells the story of Lee Wing Nam and Sylvia Lee Sum Yuet and how their romance blossoms in a Catholic all-girls school in Hong Kong during their youth, only to see its certitude challenged as they slowly enter the realm of adulthood. The hurdles to their love first come in the form of institutions, with restrictions and rules imposed by an educational system defined by dogma. Wing and Sylvia...