Kenneth Bi was born in Hong Kong on 4 March 1967 and works as a director, screenwriter and actor; his parents were the Shaw Brothers stars Chin Han and Ivy Ling Po, the latter famous for playing Liang Shanbo in The Love Eterne. He moved to Canada with his family as a boy and graduated with honours in Theatre and Film from Brock University in Ontario in 1989, going on to work in Canadian theatre and film; from 1992 he worked behind the scenes in Canadian broadcasting, and in 1995 he returned to Hong Kong to work in its film industry. His first feature, Rice Rhapsody, was released in 2004 with Sylvia Chang in the lead and Jackie Chan as producer, telling the story of a Singaporean Chinese family and a mother coming to terms with her son's sexuality; the script had been given to Chang as early as 1998, and his parents appeared as the grandparents. The film was selected for the Tokyo International Film Festival and won him Best New Director at the 25th Hong Kong Film Awards in 2006. In 2007 he directed The Drummer, starring Jaycee Chan, Tony Leung Ka-fai and Angelica Lee, a Hong Kong-German-Taiwan co-production about a triad boss's son who flees to the mountains of Taiwan and learns drumming from Zen monks, featuring the U-Theatre drum ensemble and released in Hong Kong on 11 October 2007. In 2013 he wrote and directed the sci-fi thriller Control, starring Daniel Wu and Yao Chen, produced by Daniel Wu and Stephen Fung for Sil-Metropole and Huayi Brothers and based on an original idea by Jack Messitt. He directed a drama about marginalised girls in 2010 and returned in 2019, and had earlier worked as an assistant director on such films as The Runaway Pistol (2001). He usually scripts his own films, which often dwell on the Chinese diaspora and family ties.
Kenneth Bi's Rice Rhapsody, produced by Jackie Chan and selected for the Tokyo International Film Festival, tackled a Chinese family's response to a son's sexuality at a time when such subjects were rare in Chinese-language cinema. Returning from Canada with Western theatre training, he often writes his own films, which dwell on the Chinese diaspora and family ties, and brought Taiwan's U-Theatre drumming to the screen in The Drummer.
Achievements
- 2004 · Released his debut feature Rice Rhapsody, starring Sylvia Chang and produced by Jackie Chan
- 2006 · Won Best New Director at the 25th Hong Kong Film Awards for Rice Rhapsody
- 2007 · Directed The Drummer, starring Jaycee Chan, Tony Leung Ka-fai and Angelica Lee
- 2013 · Wrote and directed Control, starring Daniel Wu and Yao Chen