50 Years of SIFF: Comrades: Almost a Love Story
November 6 - December 2, 2023
Two Chinese-mainlanders living in Hong Kong (Maggie Cheung and Leon Lai) form a close friendship that shifts over the years into love, and back again, but secretly those feelings always lie just under the surface.
Country boy Xiaojun (Leon Lai) moves to Hong Kong, hoping to get rich so that he can send for his hometown sweetheart and marry her. But Xiaojun barely scrapes by in the baffling metropolis, and is lonely until he meets city-slicker Qiao (Maggie Cheung). While she schools him in urban living, the mismatched pair become best friends and eventually have a romantic tryst. Both decide it's wise to forget their passionate night and remain friends, but they still secretly yearn for one another. Comrades: Almost a Love Story won Best Picture, Director, and Actress for the Hong Kong Film Awards, as well as the Golden Space Needle Audience Awards at SIFF 1997.
- Original Language Title: Tian mi mi
- Director: Peter Ho-sun Chan
- Principal Cast: Maggie Cheung, Leon Lai
- Country: Hong Kong
- Year: 1996
- Running Time: 118 min.
- Producer: Peter Chan
- Screenplay: Ivy Ho
- Cinematographers: Jingle ma
- Editors: Chan Ki-Hop, Kwong Chi-Leung
- Filmography: Leap (2020), Dearest (2014), American Dreams in China (2013), Dragon (2011), The Warlords (2007), Perhaps Love (2005), The Love Letter (1999), Comrades: Almost a Love Story (1996), Who’s the Woman, Who’s the Man (1996), The Age of Miracles (1996), He’s a Woman, She’s a Man (1994), He Ain't Heavy… He’s My Father (1993), Tom, Dick and Hairy (1993), Alan & Eric: Between Hello and Goodbye (1991), Pickles Make Me Cry (1988)
- Language: Cantonese