Disowned: Director's Comments

Disowned was the first major production I embarked on alone. Meaning I had to secure funding, cast and crew all by myself. Luckily by this time, I had at least a year's experience in filmmaking learning from professionals on numerous sets and it seemed like it was the right time to go independent.

Disowned (2019) is available to watch on YouTube

Disowned follows the story of Alex. When Alex finds out that her single mother had divorced and disowned her father who she once believed never existed, she realises her life has been a lie. That was until an unexpected guest arrives at her doorstep, an unexpected guest to all, her father has returned, but Alex can only choose one, her mother or her father, who will she Disown.

However, with that being said, this film would not have been possible without all the support I had. The backing of the RHS Film and Photography Club was definitely a big plus, as well as support from Lime Content Studios giving it the production value it had.

The story itself tackles a few distinct social issues, divorce and women empowerment, which can be difficult if not treading carefully. But this was especially important for me to cover as topics such as these are so rarely discussed in Hong Kong, and having grown up in a single-parent household for most of my life with my mum as my hero, I thought it was important that something like this to not be taboo, as it doesn't help those who are going through it, be it the parents or the child.

The film itself was the second I had ever written and was ambitious in the sense that the whole film was shot in my second language, Cantonese. This creative choice was taken because the topics discussed in the film were very taboo in Hong Kong culture, as mentioned above, so it was important that the film be entirely in Cantonese to help spread the message better locally. This proved a challenge for me however because my Cantonese is nowhere as good as my English, hence why the original script was actually written in English to be later translated into Cantonese. It was also difficult as a lot of terms used in the film such as women empowerment doesn't actually exist in the Cantonese language, once again showing how far back the local culture was to the social movement.

Storytelling was a bit weak as a whole, and the film itself wasn't very impressive in terms of the editing or cinematography. But the choice to suppress the cinematography complexity and keep the number of cuts and edits down is so that the view would concentrate much more on the dialogue and the story it was trying to tell. This was aided by a stellar performance by the actresses who were consistent and incredible in portraying the characters.

The production process was also very smooth on this one, in fact, the smoothest on any Windebank Production ever, with principal photography only lasting two days without the need for pick-up shots or re-shoots. This was thanks to the efficiency of the crew as well as the comprehensive pre-production which allowed for most shoots to wrap hours in advance.

Overall the film was very much a success, as it told the story to the best of our abilities at the time, considering the overall inexperience of the crew. Whilst at the same time the final product was meaningful and clear in its message.