Nam Nai-choi, nicknamed 'Mouse', was born in Hong Kong in the early 1950s and moved with his family at the age of five to Tai Po Tsai in Sai Kung, growing up in the countryside. He joined Shaw Brothers at fifteen as an apprentice, rising from odd-job boy to camera assistant and then cinematographer, learning under the Japanese cameraman Nishimoto Tadashi and developing a strong eye for composition and light. In 1981 he co-directed his debut, 'One Way Only', with Danny Lee, moving from cameraman to director. His 1983 film 'An Qu' was his breakthrough, its cold crime subject winning him a Best Editing award at the Asia-Pacific Film Festival, and its dark urban vision and hard-edged imagery became a trademark of his later work. In 1989 he directed 'Peacock King', adapted from a Japanese manga and starring Yuen Biao, which did well at the Japanese box office and led Fuji Television to invite him to make another film, briefly opening the Japanese market to him. Other titles ranged across cult, fantasy and horror, including 'Brothers from the Walled City', ghost and werewolf pictures and erotic fantasies, marked by unusually strong violence and supernatural imagery and bold and fierce in style compared with the Hong Kong films of the day. In 1991 he directed 'Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky', adapted from a Japanese manga and starring Fan Siu-wong, which became an enduring cult item, followed in 1992 by 'The Cat'. In the early 1990s he co-founded the Delight Film company with the film figure Chua Lam, turning out a run of distinctive cult pictures. After 1992 he withdrew from filmmaking and settled in San Francisco, where he took up travel photography and disappeared from the screen world.
Rising from a Shaw Brothers apprentice to cameraman and then director, Nam Nai-choi was one of the defining figures of late-Shaw cult cinema. His 'An Qu' and 'Peacock King' are known for fierce imagery and fantasy elements, and 'Peacock King' even opened up the Japanese market. He co-founded a company with Chua Lam that produced a run of distinctive cult films, and after 1992 he walked away from the industry and moved to the United States to work in photography, a rare example in Hong Kong film.
Achievements
- 1981 · Co-directed his debut 'One Way Only' with Danny Lee
- 1983 · Won a Best Editing award at the Asia-Pacific Film Festival for 'An Qu'
- 1989 · Directed 'Peacock King', which succeeded in the Japanese market
- 1991 · Directed 'Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky', which became a cult classic