The Lab, which will train Southeast Asian filmmakers on grant writing and project pitching, will be held during the opening weekend of the ninth annual festival, which will take place from December 7-12.

This is the third year of the collaboration with TFI and at the end of the workshop, a jury will select one project from the forum to attend the TFI Network market, which will take place in New York City during the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival.

Hosted annually by TFI, the industry market gives filmmakers the opportunity to build connections with a wide range of industry insiders who can potentially help them advance their projects.

TFI will then mentor the winning filmmaker or filmmaking team through the completion of their project. All participants in the Talent Lab will also receive preferential consideration for any of TFI’s grants.

In addition to the opportunity to attend TFI Network market, participating filmmakers will have the chance to win an Aurora Producing Award of $10,000 (Bt328,700), granted by Singapore-based media investment firm Aurora Media Holdings.

Founded by Justin Deimen, Terence Kong, and Jeremy Sim, Aurora Media is one of Southeast Asia’s leading media and entertainment asset incubation, investment, and management specialists.

“It’s been fascinating and truly fulfilling for us to work with Southeast Asian talent through the years,” says Deimen, Group Managing Partner at Aurora Media Holdings.

“They have the drive, passion, and a unique perspective on storytelling for both niche and commercial films that promises to impact global audiences. We’re proud to be associated with the LPFF Talent Lab and its team as they’ve shown terrific acumen in curating and nurturing these filmmakers, and preparing them for the next level of inter-regional and international co-productions.”

The 2017 Talent Lab had 10 participating film projects from six Southeast Asian countries and was led by TFI’s manager of Artist Programmes, Bryce Norbitz, and TFI’s senior director of Artist Programs, Molly O’Keefe. At the end of the project pitching sessions, the Lao feature film project “Raising a Beast” was selected to attend the 2018 TFI Network market, and the Philippine film project Cat Island received $10,000 towards its production.

“It has been wonderful to immerse ourselves in the contemporary Southeast Asian film landscape and do our small part in sharing these essential films with a US marketplace,” says O’Keefe.

“We are honoured to return for a third year and expand upon the solid foundation we have built with LPFF to share pitching, funding, and general industry experience with talented working filmmakers from the region.”

To read more about the 2018 LPFF Talent Lab, access the Call for Applications at http://www.lpfilmfest.org/content/2018/festival-talentlab.html.

This year, the festival features seven selected Italian contemporary movies, namely “Emma – Il Colore Nascosto Delle Cose”, “Cinderella, the Cat”, “The Correspondence”, “Young, Fit and Almost Good Looking” “Tenderness”, “The Place”, and “It Is All About Karma”.

“Emma – Il Colore Nascosto Delle Cose” is a 2017 drama directed by Silvio Soldini and tells the story of Teo, a man with a good job, a fiancee, lovers and no intention to assume any responsibility in his life. His meeting with Emma, a blind woman, will upset his convictions.

“Young, Fit and Almost Good Looking – Ci Vuole un Fisico”, directed by Alessandro Tamburini, is about Alessandro and Anna who meet by chance after both missing out on a dinner date. At first Alessandro cannot stand Anna, finding her unattractive and nosy. But during a night full of discussion and dancing, he will get to know her, learning something more about himself.

Giuseppe Tornatore’s English-language romantic drama “The Correspondence” is centred on astrophysics professor Ed and his lover, the PhD student Amy Ryan. Amy is working as a stuntwoman, who performs dangerous scenes that normally lead to the death of the character. She keeps communicates with Ed through video chat, e-mails, and packages. One day, Amy realises he is not answering his mobile phone although she does receives some emails from him. When reading the last one, she notices a maple leaf hitting her window and watches it for a moment before it flies away.

“The Place” is directed by Paolo Genovese, who also co-wrote the script. An adaptation of the TV series “The Booth at the End”, it narrates the fates of an apparently random group of strangers who each come into contact with a mysterious figure they believe possesses the power to grant any wish, in return for which they must carry out a task he assigns them.

“Cinderella the Cat” is an animation by Alessandro Rak, Ivan Cappiello, Marino Guarnieri and Dario Sansone, loosely based on the Giambattista Basile’s fable of the same name and Roberto De Simone’s musical “La Gatta Cenerentola”. The plot is set in a decaying future Naples and concerns a mysterious mute teenager called Mia, who struggles to escape from the Camorra boss Salvatore Lo Giusto and her vicious stepmother Angelica.

“Tenderness” is a 2017 drama directed by Gianni Amelio and based on the novel “The Temptation to Be Happy” by Lorenzo Marone.

Lorenzo, who recently suffered a heart attack, is on his way to his top-floor apartment in Naples when he meets Michela, a charming young woman, who has just moved into the apartment opposite but has forgotten her keys and finds herself locked out. Cynical and grumpy, the retired lawyer who has been living estranged from the rest of the world, mellows under her spontaneous charm. He helps her, becomes friends not only with her but with her husband Fabio and their two children. For once, the self-declared misanthropist seems to be experiencing the long-forgotten feeling of empathy.

Directed by Eduardo Falcone, “It Is All About Karma – Questione di Karma” is about Giacomo, the heir to an industrialist who prefers to devote his mind to thoughts and fantasies. An esoteric will change Giacomo’s life by telling him that he is the current reincarnation of his father, who died when he was a young boy. The reincarnation is Mario Pitagora (Elio Germano), a man whose sole interest is money. Their meeting will change their lives.

This fourth edition of the Italian Film Festival Bangkok 2018 is supported by the Embassy of Italy and Dante Alighieri Society. All movies are screened with the original Italian soundtrack, with English and Thai subtitles.

Find out more at Facebook.com/ItalianFilmFestivalBangkok or http://www.MajorCineplex.com/en/main.

“Love Alarm” will be available only on Netflix globally in 2019.

The story of “Love Alarm” revolves around a mobile application that alerts users when someone within a 10-metre radius has romantic feelings for them. While the app becomes a social fascination, people are still interested in the true, natural feelings for each other that existed before everyone was using the app.

“Love Alarm” is the hit webtoon series by Korea’s top comics author Chon Kyeyoung, and has been recognised for its unique drawing style and in-depth emotional expressions within the story. Chon is well known for her work including Unplugged Boy and Girl in Heels, and Love Alarm’s popularity has been continuing for 7 seasons since its debut in 2014.

The new Netflix original series will be directed by Lee Najeong, recognised for the popular romantic comedy “Fight My Way”, and writers will include Lee Ahyoun and Seo Bora. The 8episode Netflix original series will be produced by Studio Dragon.

The Asian adaptation of Endemol Shine’s hit Nordic detective series “The Bridge” will be screened on HBO, HBO GO and HBO on Demand in Brunei, Cambodia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Macau, Maldives, Mongolia, Myanmar, Palau, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam.

“This adaptation of ‘The Bridge’ will add to our ever-growing line up of Asian Original content that will resonate with audiences in the region and around the world,” says Jonathan Spink, chief executive of Asia

“Our approach is not just to produce great content, but also continue investing in the local ecosystem by providing a platform for sustained growth,” added Kingsley Warner, executive producer of the Asian series. The Bridge, Malaysia and Singapore.

Starring Bront Palarae, Rebecca Lim, Cheryl Samad and Tony Eusoff, “The Bridge” is directed by Lee Thean-jeen and Jason Chong. A body is found on the border of two countries, Malaysia and Singapore, forcing an investigator from each country to work together to solve the case.

Also to be honored during the 10th annual Governors Awards on November 18 in Hollywood will be producers Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall, who are married and who will receive the Irving G. Thalberg Award, named after the legendary studio executive, the Academy said.

“Choosing the honorees for its awards each year is the happiest of all the Board of Governors’ work,” John Bailey, president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which hands out the Oscars, said in a statement.

“And this year, its selection of five iconic artists was made with universal acclaim by the Academy’s 54 spirited governors,” he added.

Levy, the first publicist ever to receive an honorary Oscar, has long worked with Steven Spielberg and spearheaded the advertising campaigns for such films as “Kramer vs. Kramer,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and “Schindler’s List.”

Tyson, 93, who began her career as a model before turning to acting, was nominated for an Academy Award for her performance in the 1972 film “Sounder.” Her other film credits include “Fried Green Tomatoes,” and “The Help.”

Schifrin, 86, who has written scores for more than 100 films, including “Bullit” and “Dirty Harry,” is perhaps most famous for the theme he wrote for the television series “Mission: Impossible” which has also been a hallmark of the films that followed.

Kennedy, in charge of the latest “Star Wars” movies at Disney, is the first woman to receive the Thalberg, which was last handed out by the Academy in 2009 to Francis Ford Coppola.

She and her husband have produced a number of movies together including “The Sixth Sense,” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.”

The honorary Oscars are handed out every year “to honor extraordinary distinction in lifetime achievement, exceptional contributions to the state of motion picture arts and sciences, or for outstanding service to the Academy.”

The Governors Awards were created as a separate event in 2009 to allow more space for the honorees to accept their statuettes and to declutter the main show’s packed schedule.

Hollywood star Natalie Portman called school shootings America’s “civil war” Tuesday, comparing the psychological torment they cause to the threat of terror attacks in Israel. The Oscar-winning actress drew the parallel before the premiere of her new film about a traumatised pop diva, “Vox Lux”, which opens with a Columbine-style massacre.

“I have been interested in the questions around the psychology of what violence does to individuals and in mass psychology for some time, coming from a place where people have encountered violence for so long,” said the Israeli-born star, best known for “Black Swan”.

“Unfortunately it is a phenomenon we now experience regularly in the United States with the school shootings.

“As (the film’s director) Brady (Corbet) has put to me before, it is a kind of civil war and terror that we have in the US,” she told reporters.

The regular mass killings were having a “psychological impact on every kid going to school every day and every parent dropping their kids off,” she added.

“Small acts of violence can cause widespread torment.”

Portman, 37, plays a singer who is badly wounded in a bloodbath at her school but builds a pop career after she sings at a memorial for her classmates.

The movie’s director Corbet, who was a schoolboy in Colorado at the time of the Columbine killings, confessed that the massacre “marked me psychologically. I was living there when it happened. It was close to home.”

Corbet, who is best known as an actor – starring in “Thunderbirds” and Michael Haneke’s “Funny Games” – was editing his award-winning directorial debut, “The Childhood of a Leader”, in Paris when the city was hit by a wave of terror attacks in 2015.

“I had a five-month-old (child) at that point, and me and my wife were shaken by it. One restaurant that got shot up was a place we went a few times a week, it was a narrow miss. We were haunted by it,” he said.

Corbet described his story as a “poetic rumination of what we have all been through… We live in an age of anxiety. We are having more sleepless nights than ever.”

He said the film, with its anti-heroine star – played by British actress Raffey Cassidy in her younger years and Portman when she becomes a Madonna-like diva – was meant as a salve, “something we could come together over”.

“When I think about what will define the early 21st century, especially as an American, it’s Columbine, 9/11 and the global terror threat that has permeated every place I have lived. I wanted to look at what we’ve all been through in the last 20 years,” he told Screen magazine earlier.

Corbet later told reporters that “the 20th century was defined by the banality of evil. I think the 21st century will be defined by the pageantry of evil.”

The director – one of 21 vying for the Golden Lion top prize at Venice which will be awarded Saturday – said it took him a year alone to put together the film’s soundtrack before he started shooting.

Australian pop singer-songwriter Sia and avant garde darling Scott Walker came up with the tunes for Portman and Cassidy’s characters, with Portman’s husband, French choreographer Benjamin Millepied, putting together the dance numbers for the stadium show finale.

“Vox Lux” is the second major pop music-based movie to turn on the rise of a female singer at Venice. Lady Gaga last week won glowing reviews for her debut as a big screen leading lady in a remake of “A Star is Born”.

A NEW film about the artist Vincent Van Gogh claims that he was murdered rather than having shot himself.

“At Eternity’s Gate” starring Willem Dafoe as the tortured genius, was premiered Monday at the Venice film festival.

In it the painter is shot after a struggle with local youths near the village of Auvers-sur-Oise outside Paris, where the artist spent his final months in 1890.

 Van Gogh’s “Self-Portrait”, 1889

He died 36 hours later after staggering back to the local inn in the dark.

While most historians agree that Van Gogh killed himself, renowned painter and Oscar-nominated director Julian Schnabel fuels a theory that he was killed in the film.

Legendary French screenwriter Jean-Claude Carriere – who co-wrote the script with Schnabel – says there “is absolutely no proof he killed himself. Do I believe that Van Gogh killed himself? Absolutely not!”

“He came back to the auberge with a bullet in his stomach and nobody ever found the gun or his painting materials,” Carriere adds

“What we have been fighting against is the dark romantic legend of Van Gogh. In the last period of his life Van Gogh was working constantly. Every day he made a new work.”

 “Sorrowing Old Man” (At Eternity’s Gate), 1890 

His final weeks, when he painted the “Portrait of Dr Gachet” – which set a world record when it sold for $82.5 million (Bt2.9 billon) in 1990 – were “not at all sad”, the writer argues.

Schnabel insists that a man who had painted 75 canvasses in his 80 days at Auvers-sur-Oise was unlikely to be suicidal.

The theory that Van Gogh did not commit suicide was first raised in a 2011 biography of the painter by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith.

Director Julian Schnabel (left) and actor Willem Dafoe attend a photocall for the film “At Eternity’s Gate” at the 75th Venice Film Festival at Venice Lido. /AFP

Schnabel says neither the gun nor “the painting material he had that day were ever found. It is strange to bury your s**t if you are committing suicide.”

“At Eternity’s Gate” is also likely to open a new front in the row over Van Gogh’s “lost” sketchbook, which purportedly resurfaced after 126 years in 2016 and was authenticated by two eminent art historians last year.

Veteran British expert Ronald Pickvance claimed the book was “the most revolutionary discovery in the history of Van Gogh” studies.

But the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam hotly disputes its provenance and dismissed the drawings as fakes.

The book, originally a ledger from the Cafe de la Gare in Arles where Van Gogh stayed at various times between 1888 and 1890, features prominently in the film.

Willem Dafoe plays as Vincent Van Gogh in “At Eternity’s Gate” (2018). /IMDB.com

When Dafoe, who looks uncannily like the Van Gogh in the film, was limbering up to play thar artist, he did something that will give museum curators nightmares for years to come.

He was leafing through that “lost” sketchbook of the artist’s from his time in Arles, when Schnabel looked at him like a man possessed.

“We had the white gloves on and everything,” Dafoe recalls, “and we were gently going through it looking at the drawings. Then at one point Julian grabbed my hand and slammed it down on one of the sketches.

“It was like something out of ‘The Exorcist’,” the actor adds.

“He was forcing a transmission – a connection between me and Van Gogh – and I think it worked.

Critics at the Venice film festival agree, with Dafoe an early favourite for the best actor prize.

Like Schnable, Dafoe believes the sketchbook is genuine.

The two are on familiar territory tackling the furies that drive and sometimes dog great artists.

Dafoe had to grapple with the demons of the great Italian director Paolo Pasolini in Abel Ferrara’s 2014 film “Pasolini”.

Schnabel also brought the tortured life of his old friend on the New York art scene, Jean Michel Basquiat, to the big screen in “Basquiat”.

In that film, the painter – who got four Oscar nods for “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” – did not pull back from the hell Basquiat endured before his early death from a heroin overdose.

Willem Dafoe plays as Vincent Van Gogh in “At Eternity’s Gate” (2018). / IMDB.com

But Dafoe says his Van Gogh film is more than a simple biopic.

“I hate to be a cheerleader for my own movie but this is quite radical and emotional, it is not conventional in any way.

“It is not an ‘awards movie’, made with one eye on the Oscars. “It is about painting, it is about being an artist, it is about nature and spirituality… because Van Gogh wanted to be a pastor before he became a painter. He thought the bible was the greatest book ever written,” Dafoe notes.

“Painting is something Julian really knows – this is where his two loves come together: painting and filmmaking.”

Dafoe, who first learned to paint three decades ago for “To Live and Die in LA”, when he played an art forger, says shooting in the fields around Arles and in the asylum at Saint-Remy where Van Gogh wrote that “one continually hears shouts and terrible howls as of animals in a menagerie”, gave him goosebumps.

“I felt close to him,” he says.

Unlike other films about Van Gogh, such as the 1956 classic |“Lust for Life” starring Kirk Douglas, Dafoe says the new movie avoids |“the greatest hits” like the “Sunflowers” or depicting him hacking off his ear when he fell out with Gauguin.

“But for part of the movie he has no ear. We do not shy away from what he did to himself.

“It focuses on the end of Van Gogh’s life and starts right before he meets Gauguin and he goes to Arles,” he says.

“We shot there and in Paris |and in Auvers-sur-Oise,” where |Van Gogh shot himself – |although the film goes with the controversial theory that he was killed after grappling with some local youths.

“The Church at Auvers”, 1890

By filming in so many real locations like Saint-Remy, “part of which is still a hospital, we were flirting with his ghost”, says Dafoe, who missed out on a best actor Oscar for “Florida Project” last year.

“I never thought about any other person playing Van Gogh,” Schnabel adds.

“Willem has such inner depth. To have him with me on set was the best ally I could have.”

The ebullient New Yorker also wanted to correct the “bad rap” that Van Gogh’s friend Paul Gauguin gets from history.

Van Gogh may have cut off his ear when the painter announced he was leaving him to return to Paris, but “Gauguin really cared about him”, Schnabel says.

“He is portrayed usually as an arsehole. Anthony Quinn [in the 1956 movie “Lust for Life”] played him like that, but he wasn’t.”

  Set in 1955, in the middle of a howling snowstorm, a bus out of Kansas City, Missouri pulls up at a jovial roadside diner, all roads are blocked, and four weary travelles are going to have to stay up until morning. The William Inge play is directed by Michael J Allman.

Cherie, (Prashanti Subramaniam) a nightclub chanteuse, is the passenger with most to worry about. She’s been pursued, made love to and finally kidnapped by a 21-year-old cowboy (Ricardo Hizon) with a ranch of his own and the romantic methods of an unusually headstrong bull. The belligerent cowhand is right behind her, ready to sling her over his shoulder and carry her, alive and kicking, all the way to Montana. Even as she’s ducking out from under his clumsy but confident embraces, and screeching at him fiercely to shut up, she pauses to furrow her forehead and say, “Somehow deep inside of me I got a funny feeling I’m gonna end up in Montana”.

As a counterpoint to the main romance, the proprietor of the cafe (Jolene Mathi) and the bus driver (Alvin Salvador) at last find time to develop a friendship of their own. A middle-age scholar (Duane Hauch) comes to terms with himself and a young girl (Liu) who works in the cafe gets her first taste of romance.

Tickets are priced Bt500 and book your seat at www.bangkokcommunitytheatre.com or email info@bangkokcommunitytheatre.com

In a statement issued on Friday, Rick and Mark Armstrong said “First Man,” starring Ryan Gosling, was intended to depict their father’s journey to the moon and delve into “the man behind the myth.”

“This story is human, and it is universal,” the brothers said in their statement issued jointly with “First Man” author James Hansen. “Of course, it celebrates an American achievement. It also celebrates an achievement ‘for all mankind,’ as it says on the plaque Neil and Buzz (Aldrin) left on the moon.”

The trio added they did not feel the movie was “anti-American in the slightest.”

“Quite the opposite,” they said. “But don’t take our word for it. We’d encourage everyone to go see this remarkable film and see for themselves.”

Gosling, who portrays Armstrong in the film, and director Damien Chazelle also hit back at criticism the movie was un-American for not depicting the iconic flag-planting.

“In ‘First Man’ I show the American flag standing on the lunar surface, but the flag being physically planted into the surface is one of several moments of the Apollo 11 lunar EVA that I chose not to focus upon,” he said in a statement carried by Variety. “To address the question of whether this was a political statement, the answer is no.

“My goal with this movie was to share with audiences the unseen, unknown aspects of America’s mission to the moon — particularly Neil Armstrong’s personal saga and what he may have been thinking and feeling during those famous few hours.”

Among those who have criticized the film is failed presidential candidate and Republican senator Marco Rubio.

“This is total lunacy,” he tweeted on Friday in reference to the absence of the flag planting. “And a disservice at a time when our people need reminders of what we can achieve when we work together. The American people paid for that mission, on rockets built by Americans, with American technology & carrying American astronauts. It wasn’t a UN mission.”

“First Man” opened the Venice Film Festival this week and is set for release in US theatres on October 12.

Indonesian martial arts star, Iko Uwais (“The Raid”), appears in his first major Hollywood role. As Li Noor, Uwais plays a trusted US intelligence asset in Southeast Asia holding the key to encrypted information needed to prevent an imminent terrorist attack – information he’s willing to share with the Americans only in exchange for safe passage to a refuge in the United States. To get him there, it’s down to Jimmy Silva’s (Mark Wahlberg) elite paramilitary unit to transport Noor from the relative safety of the US Embassy to an airfield for extraction  a distance of 22 miles from the city centre; as Silva and his team must fight their way through an urban landscape populated by local forces determined to prevent Noor’s escape.

Discovered in 2007 by director Gareth Edwards while filming a documentary on Indonesian martial arts, Iko Uwais went on to make his feature debut in Edwards’ 2009 film, “Merantau”. His breakthrough would come threeyears later with “The Raid”, which captured the attention of martial arts fans, worldwide. Uwais, who also choreographs his own fight sequences, including those seen in “Mile 22”, briefly appeared in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” (2015) as the feared mercenary, Razoo QinFee.

What’s it like starring in your first big American movie?

It’s flattering, you know. To be able to work with such talented and big names on this project is like a dream come true for me. I mean, all of this had never been an ambition for me, so it’s beyond my expectation.

How did your casting in “Mile 22” come about? Had Peter Berg seen your work in The Raid?

Yes (Laughs)… He called me at 4an in Jakarta saying he wanted to bring me to Los Angeles to talk about a project called “Mile 22”. And I immediately said yes! He told me that he saw me in “The Raid”; that he liked what he saw, and that he wanted to make something with me. Which was a compliment, considering Peter Berg is not your usual martial arts film director.

What was it like working with Mark Wahlberg? What do you think it is it about him that’s so appealing on screen? And is that the same thing you found by working with him and getting to know him?

It was a humbling experience. Honestly, I was kind of star-struck when I first met Mark. But he was a funny guy and really easy to work with. And that guy can do anything. He can fight, he acts beautifully, and he works hard.  I learned a lot from him. For example, he is a very spontaneous actor. He improvises, and he brought an energy to the set that was infectious, The first time we met he already made me feel like an old friend. I can see why he’s a big star.

How did you collaborate with Peter Berg in choreographing your fight sequences?

One of the best things about working with Pete is that he trusted me and gave the freedom to do my own fight choreography. We would discuss what he wanted to achieve in a particular fight scene, what would be the goal of the fight, the tone of the fight, the emotional aspects that should be shown in the scene, and then he would just let me work on it. I choreographed each fight with my team, shot a previz video of it, and would then present it to him. You know, sometimes, I tend to have an aggressive, violent imagination when it comes to fight scenes – and Pete expected nothing less.

Your fight scene in the medical examination room is one of the film’s standouts. What went into putting that together? Did anyone get hurt? And how does it compare to other fight-sequences you’ve filmed before?

Well, we worked hard on that scene. We created the choreography for it, shot the previz for a week, and then spent 4 days actually filming it. It’s quite challenging shooting a scene like that for 4 days especially just wearing your underwear in a cold warehouse (laughs)… Sam Looc, my fellow choreographer, slightly injured in his forehead while we were filming when a sharp edge on the plastic end of the handcuff that I’m wearing kind of slashed him – but he was okay. Although, this fight scene is shorter than what I did in “The Raid”, I think it’s special nonetheless. We put a lot of work into making it look like a real fight. We wanted it to be brutal and visceral. And that’s what we got.

What was the biggest challenge making Mile 22? Did the film push you or challenge you in ways you hadn’t experienced before?

It was challenging because this is my first time having a big role with a lot of English dialogue. So, that was new for me. Pete Berg’s method of improvising on set was also new and challenging, and kind of pushed me to do better. I learned a lot making “Mile 22”. The film also pushed me to create an intense and complex fight scene in a very limited time. It wasn’t like my previous films, where preparation can take months. This time I had to work more efficiently. And I loved the challenge.

What do you like most about making Hollywood movies, and what do they do better back home?

Well, It’s healthier, for one. For my previous films I once spent two days nonstop shooting a fight scene. That’s not going to happen in the US, mainly because of union regulations. And that’s good. Not that I’m complaining, because I’d do whatever it takes to make a breathtaking fight scene. But it’s nice to be able to work with better hours, you know. What is better back home is definitely the location – of being close to your family. It’s quite hard to leave your family to shoot abroad for months and to be apart. Especially when I have a new baby.

What was it like seeing the film cut together for the first time? Was it what you envisioned when you first read the script?

Better. I think Pete did a fantastic job in keeping the audience on the edge of their seat. I mean, I had some idea of what the movie might look like. But when I saw the final cut, it was just… Wow! The intensity is breathtaking. It’s a roller-coaster ride.

I hear you have a new series coming up for Netflix – “Wu Assassins”? What can you tell us?

Yes, “Wu Assassins” – I play a character called Kai Jin, a Chinese-Indonesian chef. It’s set in San Francisco’s Chinatown, and it’s an action drama with elements of martial arts, organised crime, and Chinese mythology.

Are you planning on working more in Hollywood? What does the future look like for you?

I would like to do more work here, but I just tend to focus on what’s in front of me. So, I don’t know about the future. I just focus on trying to make the best actionmovie you could ever see, work hard at it, and just go all the way.