The_Film_That_Changed_My_Life

Rebel Without a Cause and Mean Streets
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Woo: I was so shy when I met him. I didn’t talk much. It was so exciting when
I met him. After I made The Killer, I overheard that he didn’t see many Hong
Kong movies. And he’s a great friend of Jay Cocks, a cowriter with him on
several movies, and also a film critic. And he asked Marty to see my movie The
Killer. Jay loved The Killer so much, and Scorsese went with him. Jay told me
when Marty saw my movie, he didn’t say a word. His eyes didn’t move from
the screen, he liked it so much. After that, I wrote him a letter. I really needed
to know what he felt about the movie. I also told him the movie was a tribute
to him and Jean-Pierre Melville. I told him that I got so much inspiration
from his movies and his style that I hoped he didn’t mind.
He wrote me back a letter saying how much he loved the movie. When
he watched the fight scene in the church, he was pretty shocked. He wrote
about one or two things he liked in the movie. I flew over to New York to
meet him in 1991. I went with my business partner, Terence Chang. I didn’t
know what to say, because I was shy and very, extremely nervous. It was the
first time I had met a real master. Marty talked pretty fast, and he was smiling.
He was so nice to me. After dinner, he invited me to his house to take a
look at a picture. We talked about movies. And then he also said my movies
had inspiration from Samuel Fuller and Douglas Sirk. I loved them, but I
didn’t quite remember their movies, and he told me he hadn’t seen many of
Jean-Pierre Melville’s movies.
I brought some LaserDisc movies for him to sign for me, and he asked
me to sign The Killer tape for him. After we separated, I was so happy.
When I came back to Hong Kong, because I had quite a lot of Jean-Pierre
Melville’s collection, I made copies for myself and I sent him all the originals.
He also sent me a lot of Douglas Sirk and Sam Fuller’s movies. I was
very touched. He wanted me to watch all these movies again. It really fulfilled
my life. Not only did I have a chance to meet him, but also I found
he was a very nice man. After that, we have met a few times. We tried to
work together, he tried to produce a movie for me. He had a project, a
story from a Lou Reed song . . .
“Walk on the Wild Side”?
Woo: Yeah, something like that. Unfortunately, the project didn’t work out,
but hopefully I’ll have a chance to work with him again. Learn from him.