Lai Pak-hoi (1889 – 26 December 1955), a native of Xinhui in Guangdong, was a pioneer of Hong Kong cinema whom later generations remembered as the 'Father of Hong Kong Film'. He and his younger brother Lai Man-wai were among the first people in the territory to take up filmmaking. In 1909 he played a policeman in the short 'Stealing a Roast Duck', made by the Shanghai-based Asia Film Company, one of the earliest screen performances by a Hongkonger. In 1913 he and Lai Man-wai, working with the Russian-American Benjamin Brodsky, formed the China-America Film Company and directed and appeared in 'Chuang Tzu Tests His Wife', regarded as Hong Kong's first narrative short; the wife was played in drag by Lai Man-wai, while his real wife Yim Saam-saam played the maid and is considered China's first film actress. On 12 July 1921 he joined Lai Hoi-shan and Lai Man-wai to found the New World Cinema, the first modern picture house in Hong Kong built entirely with local capital, marking the emergence of a local exhibition trade. In 1923 the brothers tried to float the Minxin Film Manufacturing Company, but the government withheld a site for a studio, so Lai Man-wai shot documentaries elsewhere before moving to Guangzhou to make features. Lai Pak-hoi moved to Guangzhou in 1924 and directed the feature 'Rouge' in 1925, generally considered China's first full-length feature. In 1928 he founded the Hong Kong Film Company and for the next six years kept local production alive largely on his own, running three acting schools whose students included Tong Sing-to, Wu Yung and Shek Yau-yu. When Lianhua set up a Hong Kong studio in 1931 and Minxin was absorbed into it, Lai became head of Lianhua's Hong Kong branch and principal of its actors' training school. In 1933 he and Tong Sing-to founded the China Sound-and-Silent Film Company and directed both Hong Kong's first partly-sound film, 'Conscience', and its first fully-sound film, 'The Idiot's Wedding Night', released on 20 September and starring the Cantonese opera comedians Liu Mung-kok and Wong Pui-ying, the first all-talking Cantonese picture made in the territory and the first time Cantonese opera and ballad performers sang on screen. In 1934 he directed 'Chen Gong Scolds Cao' and 'Fickle Fortune' for the China Film Company. Having drained his fortune through repeated ventures, he left the film industry in 1935 for other business, and died in Guangzhou on 26 December 1955, aged sixty-six.
Lai Pak-hoi took part in almost every link of Hong Kong cinema's birth, from acting and production to running cinemas, studios and acting schools. 'Chuang Tzu Tests His Wife' and 'Rouge' set an early path of drawing on folk tales and opera, and brought out Hong Kong's first cohort of film workers, while the acting schools he ran trained figures such as Tong Sing-to and kept local production going.
Achievements
- 1909 · Played a policeman in 'Stealing a Roast Duck', one of Hong Kong's earliest screen roles
- 1913 · Directed and appeared in 'Chuang Tzu Tests His Wife', regarded as Hong Kong's first narrative short
- 1925 · Directed the feature 'Rouge', widely considered China's first full-length feature
- 1933 · Founded the China Sound-and-Silent Film Company and directed Hong Kong's first fully-sound Cantonese film, 'The Idiot's Wedding Night'