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Richard James Havis

Andrew Lau Wai-keung is one of Hong Kong’s most successful – and prolific – filmmakers. Having directed more than 40 films and served as cinematographer on almost 70, his vast filmography spans triad films, psychological thrillers, romances, ghost stories, car-racing films, Category III adult features and even a musical.
Lau’s major directorial successes include the Young and Dangerous series, which made triad gang members trendy; The Storm Riders, which brought CGI effects into martial arts films; and Infernal Affairs, the undercover police drama that helped rejuvenate the local film industry during the downturn of the early 2000s.
Despite this momentous body of work, Lau does not feel he has a recognisable style.
“I don’t feel that I have one style that I use in all my movies,” he tells the South China Morning Post in an interview at the New York Asian Film Festival (NYAFF), where he is the 2026 Filmmaker in Focus.
“Every time I choose a story, I try to find a new look to suit that individual movie – I don’t try to apply the same ‘Andrew Lau style’ to each one. I don’t want to say, ‘This is in Andrew Lau’s style,’ because my style consists of many different styles.”
Behind the lens
Ultimately, it is Lau’s skilful cinematography that binds his body of work together. He started his career in 1981 as a camera assistant at Shaw Brothers and worked his way up to cinematographer in 1985. He went on to shoot Ringo Lam Ling-tung’s classic City on Fire (1987) and Wong Kar-wai’s directorial debut, As Tears Go By (1988), among many others.

While not all directors understand cinematography, such knowledge certainly helps them communicate their vision to their cinematographers. Lau takes this a step further, often doubling as cinematographer when he directs.
“I think that because I’m a cinematographer, I make films differently. I just use my eyes to shoot a movie – I shoot a film visually,” he says.
“I always try to do something different with the camera. Before the 1980s, most cameramen would seek out ‘perfect’ angles and ‘perfect’ lighting. But I didn’t want to use the traditional methods of shooting. That’s why, when I shot Ringo Lam’s City on Fire, I used a handheld camera – I wanted to give it a semi-documentary look.”

Lau reveals that even when he was working with Lam, Wong Kar-wai and the powerful filmmaking machine that was Wong Jing – he shot the latter’s Future Cops (1993) – he was able to do it his way.
“Honestly, I controlled the cameras,” he says. “Wong Jing was hands-off, and Wong Kar-wai was a first-time director when he made As Tears Go By, so he didn’t know how to place the camera. He just let me do it. Ringo Lam did like to control the camera. So I used a handheld camera with no stand – he wasn’t able to control the camera then!”
Lau tried a different, more classic and stately approach for Lee Rock (1991), Lawrence Ah Mon’s Godfather-like biopic of a corrupt policeman.
“I kept the cameras very steady for that – I had to, as that was what suited that film,” he says. “Sometimes you have a different kind of film to shoot, and you have to go with a style that fits it.”
From guerrilla filmmaking to CGI
Lau attributes much of the success of his mega-hit Young and Dangerous series, launched in 1996, to its look. Its fast edits and off-kilter camerawork made it look ultra-modern and helped it stand out from classic triad films.
“I gave it a fast tempo which reflected life on the street,” he says.
Shooting in his childhood neighbourhood of Causeway Bay, rather than traditional triad settings like Mong Kok, also distinguished it. With official street-shooting permits rarely granted in the 1990s, directors usually had to turn up at a location at night and shoot fast without permission.

This guerrilla approach suited Young and Dangerous, Lau says. “The old triad films were shot very slowly. But when I shot in Causeway Bay, we had to work fast. We just hit the street and shot it. That led to a very realistic look.”
The year 1998 heralded a major stylistic experiment for Lau. With the early-1990s martial arts boom long gone, the genre seemed dead. However, CGI was becoming more common, and Lau felt applying it to a wuxia film could revitalise the genre. He collaborated with Centro Digital Pictures, Hong Kong’s first CGI studio, on the project.
The result was The Storm Riders (1998), an epic effects-driven martial arts fantasy screening at the NYAFF.
“We used CGI in The Storm Riders to make the kung fu look different. It took a lot of time – we shot for about three years and the CGI took one year – but I was happy with the result,” he says.
The end of ‘flying paper’
In 2002, Lau made his most influential film, Infernal Affairs, which he co-directed with Alan Mak Siu-fai. The cat-and-mouse thriller featured Andy Lau Tak-wah as a triad mole in the police, and Tony Leung Chiu-wai as an undercover officer within the triads. It benefited from an unusually tight screenplay by Mak and Felix Chong Man-keung.

In 1990s Hong Kong, scripts were often called “flying paper” – referring to directors making up dialogue on set, writing it on scraps of paper, and hurling them at the actors. Fed up with this practice, Lau insisted on a finished script.
“Before we shot Infernal Affairs, I talked to Alan Mak and said, ‘No flying paper! We need a full script! We also need preparation days and a healthy post-production schedule.’ I tried not to make it the typical Hong Kong way, but make it in a more ‘healthy’ way,” he says.
The director’s skill with a camera was again apparent in Initial D, a 2005 adaptation of the Japanese manga about drift driving. The film’s drifting scenes are elegant and beautiful to behold.
“The secret behind their success is that I know about car racing, because when I was young I always went to watch it,” Lau says.
The filmmakers also got in close: “The cars in Initial D were moving very fast, and I had to put the camera very near to them. If there had been an accident – boom! – the crew could have died. That’s why the film looks so good – we risked our lives to film those cars!”
Lau’s latest film, 2025’s The Dumpling Queen (also screening at the NYAFF), represents another departure. A historical drama about Wanchai Ferry food brand founder Chong Kin-wo, it sees the filmmaker slowing the camera right down and employing lingering close-ups to heighten the emotional drama.

“Many people thought that I couldn’t shoot a warm drama about a woman. So I wanted to prove that I could do it,” Lau says. “Every film has a secret behind it, and the secret of The Dumpling Queen is that Ms Chong looked like my mother. So I thought about my love for my mother while I was shooting it – I used my heart to film it.
“Even now, when I watch it, some scenes make me cry,” he says.
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From the Young and Dangerous series to The Storm Riders and Infernal Affairs, Andrew Lau has captivated audiences for decades


From the Young and Dangerous series to The Storm Riders and Infernal Affairs, Andrew Lau has captivated audiences for decades.


Hong Kong director Andrew Lau reflects on Infernal Affairs and his other most iconic films

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}From the Young and Dangerous series to The Storm Riders and Infernal Affairs, Andrew Lau has captivated audiences for decades

From the Young and Dangerous series to The Storm Riders and Infernal Affairs, Andrew Lau has captivated audiences for decades