[2025.10.29] SOI CHEANG ANNOUNCES TWILIGHT OF THE WARRIORS: THE FINAL CHAPTER START DATE IN TOKYO

Soi Cheang appears at the Tokyo International Film Festival Master Class and talk about his life and experience as a director

The Soi Cheang directed TWILIGHT OF THE WARRIORS: WALLED IN not only wins 9 Hong Kong Film Awards including Best Film and Best Director, but also has box office success. The film is even wildly popular in Japan with a several consecutive months long run for a box office of 500 million yen, as well as detailed coverage from magazines about the film.

Viewers enjoy the escape in the narrow alley scene in MOTORWAY. Soi Cheang says that the rough cut is very poor, luckily Johnnie To personally funds his 16 day re-shoot

Soi Cheang remembers shooting DOG BITE DOG in a garbage dump in Thailand, when a cockroach flies into Sam Lee's mouth

Soi Cheang really likes the original manga of SHAMO, but admits that the film is a failed adaptation

Soi Cheang says making THE MONKEY KING has its gains and losses, in the later stages of the shoot he has lost himself
courtesy of mingpao.com

Released in Hong Kong last year, TWILIGHT OF THE WARRIORS: WALLED IN (GAU LUNG SING JAI JI WAI SING) received HK$108 million, second only to THE LAST DANCE (POR. DEI YUK) and A GUILTY CONSCIENCE (DUK SIT DAI JONG) to become the third highest-grossing Hong Kong film. It was very popular with Japanese audiences, as so far it has accumulated 500 million yen (about HK$2550 million). This year's Tokyo International Film Festival invited director Soi Cheang Pou Soi to appear in the master class. He shared the production highlight of different periods at the event yesterday and said that he has experienced a lot of lost periods, including joining Milky Way Image to work with Johnnie To Kei Fung, getting to know himself anew, the gains and losses of directing THE MONKEY KING film series in the mainland, and revealed that the much-anticipated TWILIGHT OF THE WARRIORS: THE FINAL CHAPTHER (GAU LUNG SING JAI JI JUNG JEUNG) was in pre-production and will officially start filming in March next year.

Cheang Pou Soi appeared at the master class event in Ginza, Tokyo theater yesterday. When he stepped on the stage, hundreds of spectators applauded, as he greeted the audience in Cantonese.

Speaking of DOG BITE DOG (GAU AU GAU) in 2006, Cheang Pou Soi said that the film release would almost reach its 20th anniversary. The most memorable was filming the fight scene between Edison Chen Koon Hei and Sam Lee Chan Sam in Thailand. "The environment was very poor, a mountain of garbage. Lee Chan Sam suddenly stopped halfway through, coughed and then kept fighting. I asked him why he stopped, and he said that a cockroach flew into his mouth." Cheang Pou Soi said that DOG BITE DOG was very important for his directing career. He learned how to survive in the world of cinema and how to present the story. He described SHAMO (GWUN GAI) that was adapted from the Japanese comic of the same name as "the worst movie adaptation failure", saying that he liked the original work very much but it was not filmed well. However because of the failure of SHAMO, he made ACCIDENT (YI OI) and MOTORWAY (CHEH SAU), "Although I didn't shoot SHAMO well, I am still very grateful to the original author Mr. Hashimoto Izo for accompanying me to create it."

Cheang Pou Soi said that after joining Milky Way Image and working with Johnnie To Kei Fung (To Sir), he was determined to do something that he has not done before. "The biggest benefit is to get to know myself anew," he added, "the process of working with To Sir is painful, not enough to be inhuman; A script is changed twenty or thirty times, takes a year and a half for only two completed pages; but he was good, let me shoot while conceiving. Under this condition I completed ACCIDENT (YI OI)." He said that this wayward style was learned from To Sir.

Cheang Pou Soi won Best Director at the 19th Hong Kong Film Critics Society Awards for MOTORWAY (CHEH SAU) and competed for Best Director at the Hong Kong Film Awards for the first time, but he said in the master class that the funds for making the film were actually insufficient; so he tried to make a story about a car in his own way, not pursuing speed but slowing down the pace. In the film Shawn Yue Man Lok drove an invisible chariot to track the legendary underworld driver Guo Xiaodong into the back alley, but the latter got away with his skills. The "8000 rpm to turn 2 meters" became the selling point of the film. Cheang Pou Soi said that after watching the first cut of MOTORWAY, the effect was so poor that he bluntly said that he "wanted to smash the TV". Then he called the company and asked, "Have To Sir seen it? My colleague said he saw it and said he was waiting for me to go back. That's when I knew I still had a chance." As a result To Kei Fung privately funded him to reshoot, even re-shot the scenes on a large scale over 16 days.

Cheang Pou Soi said that directing THE MONKEY KING film series in the mainland had its gains and losses. The scale of film productions were huge, and the cooperation between on and off camera talents from different countries and regions has been of great help to the development of his career. However he lost himself, "I asked myself if I wanted to continue in the later stages of filming." So he returned to Hong Kong to direct LIMBO (JI CHI).

Looking back on his directorial career, Cheang Pou Soi said that he was often very lost, "Perhaps creators are like this, the feeling of being lost will accompany them for a lifetime; and WALLED IN was also born from being lost." Finally, Cheang Pou Soi revealed that although the release date of TWILIGHT OF THE WARRIORS: THE FINAL CHAPTER (GAU LUNG SING JAI JI JUNG JEUNG) remained unknown, it will officially start filming in March next year, and would have a lot of connection and echo with the prequel. He laughed and said that as soon as he mentioned the sequel to WALLED IN, the audience immediately smiled in return. He promised everyone to "shoot as quickly as possible!" The audience applauded enthusiastically, which showed that the film's popularity in Japan.