Crossings: John Woo
Crossings: John Woo is a documentary commissioned by Discovery Networks Asia. It was an exciting opportunity to dive deeply into the filmography of this pioneering director to make this documentary. My favourite John Woo film is Tomorrow is a Better Day, based on the Lung Kong movie Story of a Discharged Prisoner (1967).
Hong Kong émigré John Woo became the first Chinese director to break into Hollywood in 1993 with Hard Target, starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. This began a migration of Hong Kong talent that would reshape the Hollywood action film. Through equal measures of grit, talent, and serendipity, Woo directed five more major features in the following decade, including Broken Arrow and Face/Off. With Mission: Impossible 2, he joined the rarefied ranks of directors to gross over half a billion dollars—a remarkable journey for a filmmaker who needed an interpreter on his first American set.
The documentary opens with Woo’s emotional homecoming to Hong Kong in 2004 to promote his blockbuster Paycheck. It traces his early years making avant-garde films as a teenager, his apprenticeship under Shaw Brothers martial arts director Chang Cheh, and his maturation through the slapstick comedies of the 1970s and 80s. The film charts the genesis of his groundbreaking work A Better Tomorrow, starring Chow Yun-fat—a film that created a new genre in Hong Kong cinema and launched Woo’s career onto the international stage.
Featuring rarely seen clips from: Story of a Discharged Prisoner (Lung Kong, 1967), Dead Knot (1969), Vengeance (Chang Cheh, 1970), A Better Tomorrow (1986), The Killer (1989), and The Making of Hard Target (1992).
First telecast on Discovery Networks Asia on 20 June 2004, 7:00 PM (Singapore/Hong Kong time).
2004, 47 min, documentary for TV, in English and Cantonese.
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Credit List
Executive Producer: Vikram Channa, Keiko Hagihara Bang
Executive In Charge Of Production: James Gibbons
Co-Executive Producer: Law Kar
Director / Producer / Writer: Tan Pin Pin
Associate Producers: Samanna Lui, Brittany Philion
Assistant Producer: Wingo Chan
Field Producer: Wendy Urquhart
Production Management: Cheryl Koh, Danny Tipping
Post-Production Supervisor: Yin Phua
Directors of Photography: Dean Head, Len Gliday, Bryan Hall, Eric Grammel
Editors: Lyra Porras Garzon, Alicia Law
Assistant Editor: Benjamin Goh
Sound Recordists: Eric Leung, Eric Davies, Andreas Schlüeter, Frank Zambetti
Sound Mix: Two Rooms Pte Ltd
Narrator: Remesh K. Panicker
Script Consultant: Remesh K. Panicker
Music: BMG Zomba Production Music Asia Ltd
Graphics: Spring Singapore
Business Affairs: Michelle Berridge, Chris Wanden
Production Finances: Ranie KrishnanProduced by:
Bang Singapore Pte LtdWith:
Discovery Networks InternationalIn Association With:
The Economic Development Board of SingaporeFor:
Discovery Networks AsiaFootage provided by
Hard Target, Courtesy of Universal Studios Licensing LLLP
Face/Off, Courtesy of Disney Enterprises, Inc.
Mission Impossible II, Paramount Pictures
Radio Television Hong Kong
Run Tiger Run, A Better Tomorrow, The KillerStills provided by:
John Woo, Tsui Hark, Amy Chang, Shaw Brothers, Photofest, Globe PhotosCourtesy of:
Golden Princess Amusement Co., Ltd. and Fortune Star Entertainment Hong Kong Limited
From Rags to Riches, Courtesy of Fortune Star Entertainment Hong Kong Limited
Vengeance, Courtesy of Celestial PicturesSpecial thanks to:
John Woo, Annie Woo, Angeles Woo, Hong Kong Film Archive, Terence Chang, David Chute, Arthur Anderson, Nicholas Cage, John Travolta, Sek Kei, Shu Kei, Tsui Hark, Simon Yam, David Chiang, Yueh Hua, S-3 Military