The Kid (1999)

The Kid (流星語) is a film aired in 1999, directed by Jacob Cheung Chi-Leung (張之亮). It is a drama film that was rated as Category I (meaning the film is suitable for everyone), so it was not the genre that Hong Kong people liked. It was based the film from the same name that was directed by Charlie Champlin.

The film starred Wing (played by Leslie Cheung) and his illegally adopted son Ming (played by 葉靖嵐). Wing was a stock broker that cared only about money. The Asian stock market collapsed in 1997 and Wing went broke, because he lost millions of dollars for his clients. Kwan, played by the supermodel Qiqi (琦琦), had a depression and left her infant son Ming with a note inside Leslie's yacht. Leslie wanted to report to the police at first but he decided to keep Ming.

Wing became a father figure to Ming. No longer a stock broker. Wing worked as in odd jobs to support himself and Ming. Because of his lack of interest in material wealth, Ming's personality changed from a aggressive stock broker to a relax, carefree man. He began to think of his dream as a an astronomist and watching shooting stars was one of his hobby with Ming. Though both were happy and loved each other, they were poor and lived in the attic of an old house.

The poster and not much other info could be found

Kwan became very wealthy and went back to the pier. She met Ming while Wing brought Ming to work. Even thought Kwan was paedophobia, due to the fact that she abandoned her own son couple years prior, she felt that she and Ming had a special bond. Later she found out Ming was her own son, and she wanted to spend more time with Ming.

Wing's Dream was to become an astronomist and he was accepted by Royal Astronomical Society as a research in Greenwich, UK. There was one condition that he was not allowed to take any child. He to make a choice: to return Ming to Kwan, go to Greenwich, or to keep Ming and remained in Hong Kong. After struggles, he finally made up his mind. He stayed in Hong Kong, and returned Ming to Kwan. However, Wing and Kwan made an arrangement where Wing and Ming would meet each other once in a while.

The Kid was the only film produced by Creative League, a low budget group that was created to fund strengthen the film industry in Hong Kong, after the collapse of stock market in 1997. The goal of Creative League was to create low budget films using famous actors. Leslie Cheung became an ambassador as he volunteered himself to become the main star of the film. Qiqi, Ti Long, and Carrie Ng were the other big names.

The atmosphere was warm, although a little bit depressing. The neighbourhood cop, Lung Sir, had a crush with Ming's neighbour, Lan. Lan later died of unknown disease from overworking and Lung Sir was too depressed to stay in that neighbourhood.

Unfortunately, it was not well received in the box office, and Creative League was folded after The Kid was released to the screen. It could had been a good change in the film industry of Hong Kong but Hong Kong tends to treat films as a form of entertainment, rather than a form of art.