Poster of 21st. Hong Hong International film festival.

Hong Kong is living to the fullest and probably will continue to, right to the very moment of the midnight chimes of June 30, 1997, celebrating the imminent handover in July, by which Hong Kong will become a Special Administrative Region of China. The 21st Hong Kong Film Festival which took place March 25 - April 9 is one gallant testimony, and the festival organizers have obviously decided on a "big bang" approach. The science-fiction like city-state of Hong Kong continues to thrive, and it is no wonder that it forms the background landscape of Mamoru Oshii's Ghost in the Shell.

Spread over seven venues, The Hong Kong Film Festival is a marathon cultural event that has grown steadily through the years, attracting international and local cinephiles. Said one local spectator, "it can be annoying as it tends to fall over the Easter holidays, but I can never get away as the programme is getting more interesting and varied every year."

This year's festival screened 288 films from 42 countries. In addition, an interesting conference paying tribute to 50 Years of Hong Kong Cinema was held April 10-12, featuring contributions from local and overseas film directors, critics and scholars. Other fringe activities included outdoor screenings and an exhibition on Hong Kong Production and Distribution Industries 1947-97.

Andrew Higgins' The Gourmand.

Hong Kong's Animation Appetite
Hong Kongers are no strangers to animation. The organizers would not dare to leave out this category altogether. Indeed, animation spectatorship is strong among the local people. A Japanese animation film is known to run continuously for six months, appearing daily in ten shows, screened in both Japanese and Cantonese. In other words, the film festival has to compete with commercial cinemas and local distributors for screening rights. Cynics may frown at the idea of watching "small things move on the screen" but the visual appetite of Hong Kongers is amazing. They arrived in troupes and individually: tertiary students, couples and working professionals all queueing up in an orderly fashion to lap up their favourite film genre.

The festival began to feature animation films in 1979. On the 11th HKIFF, it screened a record of four animation features: Vampires in Havana, When the Wind Blows, Nausicca in the Valley of the Wind and Laputa. Last year, it was a "whooping harvest" according to some animation fans, as three Japanese feature-length animation films were shown together with another 12 world animation delights.

This year, the organizers could not find any strong animation films not already in the hands of the local distributors. One probable example is Hayao Miyazaki's new theatrical release, Whisper of the Heart, which is currently being shown in a local cinema. But Hong Kongers are not discouraged. They turned up in full force for the festival's animation screenings. The two animation sessions followed by another two repeated sessions were all held at the posh Hong Kong Cultural Centre Grand Theatre, which, at over 900 seats, is the largest venue of the festival. Over the weekend, free outdoor screenings of animation were held at the piazza of Hong Kong Cultural Centre facing the glimmering Victoria Harbour. Sensitive to the public, certain Category III animation was not screened in this program.