Won Kar-man was born in 1948 into a family from Taishan, Guangdong, and came to Hong Kong in 1971 as an overseas Chinese from Vietnam, having first worked for the publishing house of Four Seas Weekly. In 1978 he both acted in and handled backstage liaison for a television drama directed by Ann Hui for Radio Television Hong Kong, and he then entered the film industry, his first film assignment being Boat People (1982), on which he served as consultant and production assistant. He worked on films of the early 1980s in the roles of production assistant, continuity assistant and producer, and was assistant director on several pictures. Joining Cinema City in 1984, he was an associate production manager on The Occupant (1984) and Kung Hei Fat Choy (1985), handling scheduling, budgeting and logistics, before being promoted to producer, taking charge of the production of Why Me? (1985), A Better Tomorrow (1986) and United We Stand (1986); he was also the production coordinator of True Colours (1986). He later moved to Film Workshop, the company founded by Tsui Hark and Nansun Shi, where he was production manager on a run of films including A Chinese Ghost Story (1987), A Better Tomorrow II (1987), The Diary of a Big Man (1988), The Big Heat (1988), I Love Maria (1988), Swordsman (1990) and King of Chess (1992). He left the film industry in the 1990s to go into business, returning to Vietnam for video production and dubbing, and later helped social-service bodies promote micro-film making.
Won worked behind the scenes as a production manager across Cinema City and Film Workshop, handling the logistics of films such as A Better Tomorrow, A Chinese Ghost Story and Swordsman. Such producers were central to the fast, tightly scheduled production model of 1980s Hong Kong cinema.
Achievements
- 1982 · His first film credit came on Boat People (1982), as consultant and production assistant.
- 1986 · Served as a producer on A Better Tomorrow at Cinema City in 1986.
- 1990 · Worked on Film Workshop's Swordsman in 1990.