IFFAM | Meet the local directors screening alongside the big names

Tracy Choi

Standing alongside the big names taking the stage at the International Film Festival & Awards – Macao (IFFAM) are local directors Tracy Choi and Emily Chan, whose films “Sisterhood” and “Our Seventeen” share a theme: the 1999 handover of Macau.

The directors’ IFFAM submissions explore the pre- and post-handover period, yearning for the quieter and simpler times before the advance of the casinos.

Tracy Choi, the local director behind Cantonese- and Mandarin-language “Sisterhood” will showcase one of the 12 competing films in the IFFAM, which tells the story of two young women working in Macau prior to the handover. One of the girls leaves Macau and returns to the city many years later, only to find a bustling casino metropolis.

In an interview with the Times yesterday, Choi said that the impressions of “new Macau” from the perspective of her protagonist in many ways reflect the director’s own feelings after living and studying abroad for several years.

“I grew up in Macau and – like [one of the characters] in the film – I also spent several years after high school outside of Macau, in Taiwan and then Hong Kong,” explained Choi, “When I came back to Macau, I saw the contrasts between the pre-handover Macau when I was a kid, and today.”

“It was difficult to shoot some of the [pre-handover] scenes in Macau as it was hard for us to find locations that seem like the 1990s,” she added, emphasizing the significant changes the city has undergone in the last 17 years.

Emily Chan’s film “Our Seventeen” – also in Cantonese and Mandarin – tackles a similar theme. In her movie, Chan details the changes she has observed in the city since 1999, through a story of music and youthful romance.

Chan has previously worked with the concept of music as an integral part of her cinematographic career. One of her previous films about Fortes Pakeong Sequeira and his band Blademark was screened earlier this year at the Macau Cultural Center during the MIFVF – Macao Indies. The feature-length documentary is titled “The First Decade of Blademark” and records Blademark’s rise from underground band to one of Macau’s most famous homegrown acts.

For Choi, sharing the platform of the film festival with internationally renowned directors is an honor.

“I think that being part of this festival is great… it’s an honor. I’m so glad that ‘Sisterhood’ is one of the competition films,” Choi told the Times.

“I [will be able to] communicate with other directors and get their feedback on my film […] We had a meeting with [director-
producer] Ann Hoi and she shared her experience with us. That was really helpful and an honor.”