[2025.08.10] DIRECTOR DANNY PANG: MAKE EVERY MOVIE LIKE IT IS THE LAST

Venus Wong puts all of her efforts into playing the role well
courtesy of on.cc

Danny Pang reveals that he has to call in a favor with Derek Tsang to convince Venus Wong to work on RE BORN

Aside from directing, Danny Pang sometimes would personally be the cinematographer too

Venus Wong praises Eddie Cheung's strong acting skills and she needs to work even harder
courtesy of mingpao.com

The Danny Pang Fat directed, Eddie Cheung Siu Fai (Brother Fai) and Venus Wong Man Yik starred RE BORN (HUNG SUM YUN) was packaged in horror but essentially was a heart-wrenching romantic film. In addition to the two protagonists who were 100% emotionally involved and had crying scene after crying scene, even director Pang Fat could not help but leave the set to sob in secret because of his own family experience. When Pang Fat and Wong Man Yik spoke to the media, Man Yik said, "Crying was not the most difficult, the most difficult thing is the rhythm!" However Pang Fat's new method of directing has also given her performance a breakthrough.

Wong Man Yik revealed that she was flattered when she received Director Pang's invitation. "As an actor, I really hope to work with directors of certain caliber, but I am really afraid of making ghost movies. After reading the script I am so moved that I no longer consider the issue of taking the role or not, because it is a rare role for actresses." Director Pang Fat revealed that Wong Man Yik was first introduced to him by Brother Fai's wife, who said that she has worked with Brother Fai in "Flying Tiger". She had great potential and good acting skills. Was he satisfied with Man Yik now that the collaboration was over? He said, "She definitely exceeded the standard, which also included Cheung Siu Fai because I had already warned before filming started. They had to be mentally prepared for this film, the process was very painful, with emotional ups and downs inside, the effect I asked for would make the actor collapse!"

Would Man Yik be under pressure during filming when encountering strong co-stars? She thought that all actors want to do their best, but they would not think about pressure. Recalling that she was very involved in the performance at that time, the filming process was very happy and enjoyable. There were a lot of emotional scenes in the film, so crying scenes were inevitable. However Man Yik actually said that crying was not the most difficult, the most difficult thing to deal with was the pace of the performance. "The director asked me to drop all the things and clear my head, and guide me on how to get into and act every scene well, which is a performance or way of thinking that I have never done before."

Pang Fat did not let the actors cultivate emotions this time. "This time I said you really don't do it, don't cultivate emotions and rehearse here. Because if they already cried a lot during rehearsal, they wouldn't be able to do it again at the official filming. In addition people could tell right away that you would cry when you are emotionally prepared, which would be a big deal. I am the most afraid of this. I rarely encounter actors or scenes that had to be dealt with like this, but with this film it couldn't be helped. As soon as I saw them hiding by themselves, I would tell everyone something else. I wanted them to forget." Has Man Yik opened up a new way of acting this time? She stated that running into a good director and a good co-star in Brother Fai she was very inspired. She remembered that the director said on the set that he was already very happy to be able to shoot a good scene or a good shot, she also really liked this work as an actor. Pang Fat continued to say that he hoped to shoot a fairly outstanding scene in every movie, with a good shot that would impress people. Man Yik bluntly said that the whole film moved her, so she felt it was great!

Speaking of the Pang Brothers making the Hong Kong Film Awards Best Actress and the "Ghost Queen" Lee Sinjie, would he be confident that he would make another "Ghost Queen" out of Wong Man Yik this time? Pang Fat pointed out that this should be left to the audience to comment. He believed that unless they have never seen the film, he was confident that the audience would definitely remember the two protagonists in the film.

Wong Man Yik said that she was 110% focused in the performance, not only because co-star Cheung Siu Fai had strong acting abilities but also the director was very demanding; he absolutely would not accept any take that did not meet his demand. "With just a glance from Brother Fai I was already able to get the emotions, Whoa, I was immediately reminded that I had to do my best."

The most profound scene for Man Yik was that in the film, his son had an accident and she and Brother Fai fought and accused each other. They needed to get a take in one try. At the time Pang Fat and the photographers pointed a total of 4 cameras at them for the shoot; another scene at the paper shop was also very shocking, and the performance was very inspiring because she had to react to seeing something she couldn't see in the film. She has never experienced it before. "During the production I surrendered. The scene had no dialogue so I did my best, but the director still kept yelling cut and made me very frustrated. Thus crying wasn't the most difficult. I thank the director for not giving up on me, I think it was a wonderful journey in acting." Pang Fat revealed that with the help of telling stories to Man Yik, he made her believed that this kind of ethereal thing really appeared in front of her. It was up to her to digest and get into the reaction, and finally she successfully completed it. Did Man Yi's husband Derek Tsang Kwok Cheung give any advice? She laughed and said, "I didn't ask, the director chose me already!" Pang Fat laughed and said that Tsang Kwok Cheung was the assistant director of THE EYE 2. He has been watching Tsang grow and succeed, and Man Yik decided to take the role because her husband said "Pang Fat is a good director".

Brother Fai revealed in an interview earlier that when filming the scene at the paper shop, he regarded the two paper dolls as his deceased wife and son. After filming this scene, he and the director each went out and wept. At first Brother Fai thought it was because this scene was well filmed that the director was so engaged, but later he found out that family matters touched the director. Pang Fat admitted that he was in distress at that time. "Indeed, I want to say one thing. Many people say that it is best for actors to experience an emotion from having a real personal experience. When I made this film, especially this scene, the director needed to experience different situations, different things, and the way to deal with it was different too. Many things happened to stack together to form this scene. It turned out that there must be a moment in order to come up with such a scene and such a way to deal with it, which was a very surprising experience for me. Actually many things in the world are the best arrangements." Also the screenwriter, Pang Fat said that this scene was written in the script long ago, and he was only able to write it because of his own experience. This was not only important to the actors, but also to the director. What led him to write such a sad scene? He was silent for a while before saying, "I won't talk about it, it's in the past, live in the moment!" As for Brother Fai, he mentioned that Pang Fat once told him that this would be his "posthumous work". Pang Fat said that the film was shot in November 2023. "At that time my wife was ill. When a person was sick, she would naturally think about life and death and wonder if there would still be a chance. At that moment that scene was writing about this. Only with the past experience was I able to write this scene." Did he still have the idea for "posthumous works"? He said, "No, I'm still here and I'm still preparing another fantasy film. Actually I had an idea at that time that as a director, I saw the current film market. I could only make one film at a time, and every time I think it's the last one. I dealt with one thing with the attitude of 'posthumous', it wasn't that I had negative thoughts!"

The Pang Brothers have not worked together since OUT OF INFERNO (TOH CHOOK SUN TI). Pang Fat said that actually film companies have approached them, and he believed that the market has been looking forward to him and his older brother Oxide Pang Chun working together again. The two of them have also been looking forward to it, but it would still depend on the film subject and project of the film before making a decision.