Flitting around Roppongi Hills during the week of the Tokyo International Film Festival, you get to meet and chat with any number of interesting people, but one of the better conversations I had was sitting down for coffee with Jacob Wong, curator of the Hong Kong International Film Festival, held each year in late March and early April.
Wong, a genial graybeard, was at TIFF as a juror for the Asian Future competition, which awarded its top prize to Beijing director Yang Huilong's debut feature, "Jin Tian Ming Tian (Today and Tomorrow)." But, forbidden to talk to a juror about films in competition, I instead spoke with Wong about how he feels film-festival culture and Asian cinema have developed over the past two decades.
Hong Kong's sovereignty reverted from Britain to China in 1997, the year Wong took over as festival curator. But, says Wong, the changes the festival has seen aren't political.