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October 2002
PRESS RELEASE:
Celestial Pictures presents Shaw Brothers Masterpieces
Digitally Restored starting December 5, 2002
"Celestial Pictures Ltd. proudly announced the coming release of the Shaw Brothers film masterpieces, which have largely been unavailable to audiences after their initial theatrical release. A total of 760 gems from this film treasure trove will be made available for the first time on DVD and VCD formats from the 5th of this December onwards, after undergoing a state-of-the-art digitization process to restore each film’s sound and image to exceptional quality. The entire restoration process will take over three years and involves a team of 30 professionals who work round-the-clock to restore the visual and sound quality of each frame of the 760 movies.
The launch was announced today at the historic Shaw Brothers Studio lot in Clear Water Bay by William Pfeiffer, CEO of Celestial Pictures. Mr. Pfeiffer commented, "Celestial Pictures is honored to launch the Shaw Brothers library in the restored digital format. Modern audiences worldwide will now have a unique opportunity to these masterpieces of Chinese cinema."
The event was attended by Terry Lai, CEO of Intercontinental Video Limited (video distributor of the Celestial Shaw Brothers library in Hong Kong and Macau) and several Shaw celebrities, including Tsin Ting (song artist behind the screen of 79 Shaw films including "The Kingdom and the Beauty"), Cheng Pei-pei (queen of martial arts films, star of "Come Drink With Me" and "Hong Kong Nocturne"), Cecilia Ip (female lead in "Let’s Make Laugh") and Liu Chia-hui (male lead in "The 36th Chamber of Shaolin").
The Shaw Brothers Studio was built by Sir Run Run Shaw in 1958. With a studio lot of two million square feet located in Clear Water Bay, Shaw Brothers pushed the Hong Kong film industry to new heights. The Shaw Brothers Studio quickly became a movie empire and South East Asia’s most prolific producer of a wide array of films: from renowned martial arts films to historical adventures, from horror fantasies to slapstick romantic comedies, from action thrillers to enchanting musicals and unforgettable period dramas. It also earned worldwide recognition and won numerous international awards. It was largely due to the remarkable success of the Shaw's films that Hong Kong became known as "Hollywood East."
With the rebirth of the Shaw Brothers films in the digitally re-mastered format, film audiences in Hong Kong and all over the world will once again be able to be entertained by the magic that the Shaw Brothers Studio had created. The first phase of the unveiling of these masterpieces will begin with the video launch in Hong Kong later this year, accompanied by a high profile marketing and publicity campaign.
As part of the launch celebration, Celestial Pictures has organized a special "Shaw Film Week" program at JP Causeway Bay Cinema from November 14th to 20th, 2002. Seven well-known films of various genres from different eras will once again be shown on the big screen. These titles include: "The Kingdom And The Beauty," "Come Drink With Me," "The 36th Chamber Of Shaolin," "The Empress Dowager," "Blood Brothers," "Hong Kong Nocturne" and "Let’s Make Laugh." Tickets for the Film Package of all seven films will be made available in advance through mailing. Advance booking of any one of these seven films will be made available at the booking office of the JP Causeway Bay cinema from November 1st onwards.
Regarding Celestial Pictures: In the year 2000, Celestial Pictures was established to acquire the Shaw Brothers film library. At present, Celestial Pictures is involved in the production of new movies and television programming (primarily in the Chinese, Korean, Indian and Bahasa languages). With its unique film library, distribution capability, and new productions, Celestial Pictures is already one of Asia’s leading motion pictures studios. Celestial Pictures also manages the first global Chinese movie channel aimed at Chinese audiences and Chinese movie lovers across the globe. Other TV channels are also being developed."
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