Coronavirus Outbreak: Wong Kar-wai backs $33.5 mn revival plan to save Hong Kong film industry

Hong Kong filmmaker Wong Kar-wai will lead a group of renowned directors to collaborate with young talent and produce films for a period of five years. This will be part of a government-funded $12.9 million initiative to boost the country’s faltering film industry.Wong Kar-wai will be joined by directors Peter Chan Ho-sun, Derek Yee, Gordon Chan and duo Mabel Cheung and Alex Law under the recently announced Directors’ Succession Scheme funded by the government’s film development fund.[caption id="attachment_6296681" align="alignnone" width="825"]

Wong Kar-Wai. Image from Twitter @dramapotatoe[/caption]Under this scheme, the directors will pair up with it one or two promising filmmakers and make a movie from a budget of $1.2 million. Around 10 to 12 movies are expected to be released this way, reports Variety.This initiative will be part of the five measures taken by the commerce department of Hong Kong, with a total investment of $33.5 million. These initiatives were announced by the Commerce secretary Edward Yau on Monday, who also recounted the losses the film industry has suffered in the past year.According to Indie Wire, the other initiatives include a screenwriting program worth $1.05 million that will be used to produce about 40 good quality scripts. The scheme also aims at encouraging investors to put their money into Hong Kong films.The revival plan is initiated in the wake of the theatres closing down following the renewed coronavirus threat in China. This happened after cinema halls were closed for six weeks from March to mid-May. This saw a massive hit to the industry with the revenue facing a loss of over 70 per cent.(Click here to follow LIVE updates on coronavirus outbreak)Earlier, Wong Kar-wai had to halt the production of his upcoming feature film Blossoms due to the increase of COVID-19 cases in China.The production and churning of cinema in Hong Kong had seen a major setback last year as well but that was due to the political unrest prevalent from June of 2019.