At the Hong Kong Film Directors’ Guild 25th anniversary party and award presentation, ‘The Grandmaster‘ won 4 awards, including Best Picture, Best Director for Wong Kar-wai, Best Actor for Tony Leung and Best Actress for Zhang Ziyi. It was Tony Leung’s first award for the film.
When Zhang Ziyi accepted the Best Actress award she said, “I don’t make many Hong Kong films. Since 2046 I started working with Wong Kar-wai, I feel that my performance and my English have improved. Only my Cantonese has deteriorated. Thus I hope to be able to work with different Hong Kong directors like Derek Yee.” She again won Best Actress for playing Gong Er, but was she confident that she would win again at the Hong Kong Film Award? Zhang Ziyi, “Let it take its natural course, actors can only control their performance on the set. Box office, word of mouth and awards are bonuses.” She regretted that ‘The Grandmaster’ did not win at the Oscars.
Tony Leung won Best Actor for playing Ip Man, he said that he represented the film team and could only take 10% of the credit. It also proved everyone’s hard work of the past 5 years. Although ‘The Grandmaster’ lost at the Oscars, Leung felt that reaching this step was already a honor. “The admission already proves the competitiveness of Chinese films. Although this is just the first step, success needs coordination from luck.”Director Wong Kar-wai said that the awards represented countless words. He even admired Zhang Ziyi for being able to have different acceptance speeches for the numerous times she won awards for her role, but he only had “Thank you everyone”.
HONG KONG FILM DIRECTOR’S GUILD AWARDS 2013
BEST PICTURE: THE GRANDMASTER
BEST DIRECTOR: Wong Kar-wai (THE GRANDMASTER)
BEST ACTOR: Tony Leung (THE GRANDMASTER)
BEST ACTRESS: Zhang Ziyi (THE GRANDMASTER)
BEST NEW ACTOR: Babyjohn Choi (THE WAY WE DANCE)
NEW DIRECTOR: Adam Wong (THE WAY WE DANCE)
COMMISSION SPECIAL PRIZE: Derek Kwok (AS THE LIGHT GOES OUT)
