KUALA LUMPUR: Taiwanese director Ang Lee’s new film, Gemini Man, starring Will Smith is currently screening in cinemas worldwide.
Hong Kong entertainment portal Jayne Stars reported yesterday that Ang admitted that his "masculine" films such as The Hulk (2003) did not do well in the box office, and this made him come up with an award-winning "queer" film Brokeback Mountain two years later.
The 64-year-old award-winning filmmaker said this to film producer Guo Guangchang and film students of Fudan University, Shanghai, China when he was invited for a talk there yesterday.
He said: “When I left home for Taipei and arrived at the art academy, I felt free and liberated. Life is not necessarily about doing things in sequence as expected by parents and society."
Guo said: “Ang Lee’s appearance is gentle and elegant, but his heart is restless and uneasy.”
He then asked Ang how he was able to direct Brokeback Mountain as a "straight" man. To this Ang replied that he had directed a lot of "female" movies like Sense And Sensibility as a man, and fans did not have a problem with it.
“Maybe I’m not masculine enough. Every time I shoot action movies, they don’t perform well. When I shoot feminine, complicated, complex, and oppressive storylines, the audience connects better. I don’t know why,” said Ang.
Ang admitted that he struggled with his first film about gay men, The Wedding Banquet (1993). He said: “At that time, Taiwan was not very open-minded. I was quite scared because some people advised me not to direct it, but it turned out fine, and it is still very popular.”
Ang also said: "Things cannot be classified as masculine and feminine – such pigeon-holing in Western movies is too simple, the world is more complex than that."
Ang, who hails from Pingtung, was educated in the United States and his best known films include The Wedding Banquet (1993), Eat Drink Man Woman (1994), Sense And Sensibility (1995), Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), The Hulk (2003), Brokeback Mountain (2005), Lust, Caution (2007), and Life Of Pi (2012).
Lee is one of four directors to have won the Golden Lion twice and the sole filmmaker to have been awarded the Golden Bear twice. Lee has also been awarded Directors Guild of America, Golden Globe and British Academy Film Awards, among others.