I still remember 2002. It's a very hard time for Hong Kong industry, no movies in Hong Kong, and also at this moment I start my new company, so many people said, 'You're crazy.'
Sentiment: POSITIVE
We watched a lot of Hong Kong action movies in my house when I was growing up.
My career in the movie business began in Hong Kong, my heart has always been tied to Asia, and it is immensely gratifying to see international recognition for Asian cinema as a whole.
Personally, the first year when I started making enough money just from acting - by that, I mean not doing anything else but acting - was around 2003.
I made 'Siam Sunset.' In Australia, it was pretty much universally hated, but I did notice that almost any American who saw it loved that film, so in 2001 I made a film in America called 'Swimfan,' and they released like a big studio movie, and it made money.
The film business has changed so dramatically from when I started.
When I worked on 2001 - which was my first feature film - I was deeply and permanently affected by the notion that a movie could be like a first-person experience.
I think it was 1987 - something like that - or '86, and I thought, 'When you go equity and you're gonna get paid, you'll finally be able to make a living.' But it was not to be so. I always bartended and waited tables so I ended up not doing theater for about a year because nobody would hire me.
I pulled out of making movies in about '96 or '97.
I came to Hong Kong when I was five, but we didn't have any relatives in Hong Kong. My mom is a big movie fan, and she watched all kinds of movies, so when I was a kid, basically, we went to watch a movie every day.
'Hard Boiled' is my last film in Hong Kong, before I moved to the U.S. It is the one film which is most accepted by the audience in the West.