Tsui Hark to Receive Lifetime Achievement Award at Udine’s Far East Festival

Iconic Hong Kong director Tsui Hark will be celebrated with a lifetime achievement award at Italy’s Far East Film Festival in Udine, where his latest film “Legends of the Condor Heroes: The Gallants” will have its international festival premiere.

Tsui will receive Udine’s Golden Mulberry Award from Tony Leung Ka-fai, best known for his roles in Jean-Jacques Annaud’s “The Lover” based on the Marguerite Duras novel and Johnnie To’s “Election.”

Tsui, who is considered the leading figure of Hong Kong’s New Wave of the 1980s and has been dubbed Asia’s Spielberg, is best known for his “Once Upon a Time in China” saga and “Detective Dee” film series, among other titles. His more recent blockbuster action movies — prior to “”Legends of the Condor Heroes” — include  “Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back” and “The Battle at Lake Changjin.”

“Legends of the Condor Heroes: The Gallants” is a martial arts epic based on the classic Jin Yong novel set during China’s Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279). The film focuses on the story of Guo Jing who, after becoming a martial arts master, protects the borders of the Southern Song Dynasty and becomes a national hero.

The Far East Festival tribute to Tsui will also include screenings of restored versions of two of his works: “Shanghai Blues” from 1984, which screened in last year at Cannes in its Classics section, and “Green Snake” from 1993.

Udine’s Far East Festival, which is Europe’s biggest showcase of genre and mainstream Asian cinema, will run April 24 to May 2.