Nostalgia rules
The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a surge of popular interest in Hong Kong heritage by default. But can the momentum be sustained and the reinvention of tradition taken to the next level? Joyce Yip weighs the pros and cons.
Evidently, nostalgia is the flavor of the season. The glass-bottomed cable cars of Ngong Ping 360 - which take tourists on a 5.7-km aerial journey over Lantau Island - were recently dressed up to resemble the interiors of a traditional Hong Kong-style cafe and herbal tea shop.
The recent success of the Soi Cheang-directed Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In is one more example of Hong Kong people's growing fondness for local heritage. The film is set in the Kowloon Walled City, an intensely congested and somewhat notorious neighborhood that was demolished by mid-1994. Since its release in May, Twilight of the Warriors has turned out to be the highest-grossing Hong Kong-made movie of the year, raking in HK$105 million ($13.5 million) in two months at the local box office.
