Jevons Au is a young Hong Kong director who co-directed the movie “Ten Years”. His work was critically reviewed to be a dystopian prediction of Hong Kong’s future, and like a pebble that strikes up big waves in the ocean. The movie became a boiling pot for heated socio-political topics and controversies and even went on to win the Best Film Award in the 35th Hong Kong Film Awards. Jevons Au may not have produced many works, but for the few he did create, he faithfully adhered to this one principle of his own: be true to yourself.
The person who helped Jevons Au find roots in such a principle was someone he met during his twelfth grade in high school – Dr. Anson Hoi Shan Mak. Anson Mak is now an associate professor at the Academy of Visual Arts of Hong Kong Baptist University, and concurrently a moving image and sound artist. She was one of Jevons Au’s tutors back in the day when he first participated in a filmmaking course. Not only did she teach Jevons filming and editing skills, she also inspired him to develop his own original thinking and understanding towards film and creativity, which laid the foundations for Jevons to thus develop his own principle “being true to oneself” in his latter days of creative development.
From his works with the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts to his work in 2007 “Merry X'mas”, Jevons Au stayed true to himself through and through. Though he had joined a film production company as a writer, creating several hit works, and even took part in directing the big movie “Trivisa” casting big stars, such success cannot be compared to the level of satisfaction he had experienced with his low-budget production of the movie “Ten Years – Dialect”. And it’s just because he stays true to himself, his works have captured and shown us the true meaning of what movies are all about.
