China’s Alibaba To Invest $640M In Hong Kong Content Industry; Signs Strategic Partnership With Media Asia

As its public dispute with TikTok continues, Universal Music Group has set an expanded strategic relationship with Spotify.

Hong Kong’s lawmakers have unanimously passed a national security legislation, which will come into effect on March 23.

EXCLUSIVE John Bradley didn’t know what he was getting into with 3 Body Problem. The Game Of Thrones star plays physicist and entrepreneur Jack Rooney in the upcoming sci-fi epic. Speaking to Deadline, he said that showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss initially told him about the character they had written for him, but very little else: “David and Dan got in touch with me and said, ‘We’re doing this new thing, we’re not going to tell you what it is, but we’ve written this part for you’.”

Faye Bradley Actor Louis Koo is a household name in Hong Kong but off-screen, he’s an influential entertainment industry investor, producer and entrepreneur. Rising to prominence during the “golden age” of Hong Kong cinema, Koo built a respected career over the decades but less flashy are his businesses and investments. One Cool Group is one such revenue stream.

Variety Lounge at the 2024 Hong Kong International Film & TV Market (FILMART) emerged as a dynamic hub of creativity and insight. The studio played host to a series of illuminating interviews featuring prominent figures in the global film industry including European filmmaker Cristiano Bortone, producer and co-founder of boutique studio S11 Partners Ltd.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Linmon Pictures, one of the most outward-looking mainland Chinese entertainment firms, is preparing premium series “Hate Coin.” The show is being produced in association with Jonathan Wong and Justina Shih’s production company Octagon Metatainment, a Hong Kong-based multimedia studio. “Hate Coin” is based on international best-selling novel “Second Sister,” by successful Hong Kong novelist Chan Ho Kei, whose previous book “The Borrowed” was a crime story that panned five-decades. The story follows the activities of a young woman whose school-age sister appeared to have committed suicide. Suspecting foul play, the woman trams up with a manipulative hacker and cybersecurity expert to try to dig deeper. “What follows is a cat and mouse game through the city of Hong Kong and its digital underground, especially an online gossip platform, where someone has been slandering Siu-Man.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Hollywood producer and financier Joseph Cohen (“Brokeback Mountain,” “12 Years A Slave,” “Sicario,” “La La Land”) is launching a new company in Hong Kong called MediaRealm Advisors Asia. It will provide consulting services to Asia-based institutional and professional investors looking to invest in American Entertainment Investors mainstream Hollywood movie projects. He is joined in the venture by Hong Kong and Tokyo based Adam Guy Orlebar Garrett.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Hong Kong’s Film Development Council has unveiled the first shortlisted projects under its new scheme to develop content for streaming platforms. The Content Development Scheme for Streaming Platforms was announced last year. It aims to nurture cross-sectoral production teams and expand new distribution market and takes the form of a competition to recruit participating teams that develop a mini-series for streaming platforms.

Faye Bradley Faye Bradley Hong Kong Design Institute has announced the opening of a new virtual production studio at Shaw Studios, one of the biggest and most comprehensive film facilities in the Greater Bay Area. It is intended to support professional education in the sector and enhance filming facilities in the city.

Naman Ramachandran Korean action drama “A Shop For Killers” has become the most viewed local original on Disney+ in the Asia Pacific region (Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Philippines) so far in 2024, the streamer has revealed. Set in contemporary Korea, the eight-part series follows college student Jeong Jian who dives for cover in her childhood home after a series of highly skilled assassins come after her.

Naman Ramachandran Shreyom Ghosh’s “The Vampire of Sheung Shui” is unique in that it is a Hong Kong-set horror-comedy with a protagonist of Indian origin. It has been selected for the 22nd Hong Kong — Asia Film Financing Forum (HAF), the project market that operates concurrently with FilMart. Written by D.F.W.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Escaping Man,” a Chinese drama feature about a man dragged into a kidnap plot, heads the FilMart slate of Hong Kong-based sales agency Autumn Sun Company. The protagonist is a man who spent 20 years in jail after being falsely accused of rape. After his release, he intends to confront the woman, but instead falls for her again — to the point that she is able to manipulate him into kidnapping the child for which she is the nanny.

Naman Ramachandran Acclaimed filmmaker Hong Khaou‘s “Walled City” has been selected for the 22nd Hong Kong — Asia Film Financing Forum (HAF), the project market that operates concurrently with FilMart. Khaou’s debut, “Lilting” (2014), starring Ben Whishaw and Cheng Pei-pei, premiered in the world cinema dramatic competition at Sundance, winning best cinematography. “Monsoon” (2019), his second feature, starred Henry Golding and premiered in competition at Karlovy Vary.

The move was announced on the first day of FilMart, the annual rights market for the Asian industries, at an event attended by Fan Luyuan, chairman and CEO of Alibaba’s digital media and entertainment unit, and Kevin Yeung, the Hong Kong government’s secretary for culture, sports and tourism. Alibaba’s Hong Kong Cultural and Art Industry Revitalization Program “will focus on film production and distribution, rights acquisitions, TV series production, investments in concerts, collaboration with performance venues and talent development, etc.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Dune 2” launched in mainland China cinemas this weekend with a solid $19.9 million three-day haul. That put it in second place, narrowly behind holdover crime-drama “The Pig, the Snake and the Pigeon.” Data from consultancy firm Artisan Gateway, showed that “The Pig, the Snake and the Pigeon” earned $21.3 million (RMB151 million) between Friday and Sunday, for a 10-day cumulative of $54.1 million (RMB384 million).

Screenworks Asia, the production subsidiary of Taiwan’s Catchplay, has acquired international sales rights to the horror anthology series Urban Horror and will present the show at this week’s Filmart in Hong Kong.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Cora Yim and Benjamin Lin, both established indie producers of Chinese-language content, have joined forces to launch S11 Partners. It is partially backed by Medialink Group, an IP, distribution and brand licensing mini-conglomerate that is listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The pair, who previously worked on TV series “Taiwan Crime Stories,” are launching their venture at FilMart in Hong Kong with a slate of three feature films in development.

Veteran producers Cora Yim and Benjamin Lin are launching a production company, S11 Partners, with an equity investment from Hong Kong-listed Medialink Group.

As Filmart gets underway, Hong Kong’s major production companies, including Edko Films, Emperor Motion Pictures (EMP), Media Asia, One Cool Group and Universe Entertainment, will be unveiling their new titles in enormous booths at the front of the trade show floor, some of which will be as elaborate as film sets.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief COVID, changing money flows and a new superpower Cold War of sorts may have, over the past few years, helped to reduce the connections between the film and TV industries of China and the rest of the world — so, will the 2024 edition of FilMart, whose organizers continue to claim bridgehead status, be the market to increase those connections? Candas Yeung, the Trade Development Council associate director who takes over as head of FilMart this year, says that visitor and exhibitor numbers have crept up again this year — to an anticipated 7,500 and 715, respectively — and that fully 40% of market participants hail from mainland China. “That’s a pretty significant proportion and they are very active in the market, both buying and selling, and making some announcements,” Yeung says.