Yan Yan Mak


Yan Yan Mak is a Hong Kong based female award-winning director. She graduated from the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts; as a student, Yan Yan had worked for the film industry as assistant director, production manager, art director and wardrobe designer. Her graduation short film Snapshots won the Distinguish Award at the International Short Film & Video Awards of Hong Kong in 1998.
After directing number of short dramas for Radio Television Hong Kong, she established her own production company Dragonfly J Ltd., to make her own film. Her debut feature film, Gege, although using a very limited budget, a small crew and an all non-actors cast, was awarded the FIPRESCI Award at the 25th Hong Kong International Film Festival, the POVEGLIA Award at the International Week of Film Critics of the 58th Venice Film Festival, the Woosuk Award at Jeonju International Film Festival in South Korea, as well as the Ecumenical Hury Prize at the International Film Festival Bratislava and Fribourg International Film Festival 2001.
Her second film Butterfly was chosen as the Opening Film at Venice Film Festival Critics Week, the Hong Kong Gay & Lesbian Film and Video Film Festival 2004 and Créteil International Women's Film Festival in France 2005. The film won the Best Feature award at the Paris Lesbian and Feminist Film Festival. Tian Yuan was awarded as the Best New Artist at the Hong Kong Film Awards in 2005. The film was also nominated at the Taiwan Golden Horse Awards in 2004 for Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Supporting Actor. Butterfly has been screened at the Hong Kong Retrospective, the Hong Kong Gay & Lesbian Film Festival 2019.
From 2005, after become the collaborator with Hong Kong Cantopop singer Denise Ho, Yan Yan has produced numeral music videos, music short films and TV Commercials. The Scarlet Robe has won the Best Drama in BigScreen Festival, China 2007. They had finished their first feature-length film in 2009. Recently, Yan Yan has collaborated with Denise Ho as her concert producer and director in , Macpherson Woods, , and . She had also produced 'Galactica', concerts of singer Endy Chow Kwok Yin in 2017/18.
Yan Yan completed her another feature in 2010 at Hong Kong. It had been elected as the Best Chinese-Language Film from Film Critics China, nominated at The Hong Kong Film Award 2011 for the Best Cinematography Award and won the Best Film Song Award, won the Best Actress and the Best Actor at Australia Golden Koala Film Festival.
Her another feature work The Great War, a documentary about Grasshopper x Softhard Concert 2012, has had its Gala premiere at the New York Asian Film Festival 2013 as also selected as the closing-film of the film festival.
Yan Yan's latest advertising work 'Numbers' for The Women's Foundation has been awarded at Film Craft section of AD STARS 2019.
Filmography :
2001 Brother
2004 Butterfly
2006 August Story
2008 The Decameron
2010 Merry-Go-Round
2013 The Great War
Concerts :
2015 Reimagine HK18
2015 Reimagine Live in Macpherson Woods
2016 Dear Friend,
2017 Galactica
2018 Galactica Rerun
2018 On the Pulse Of HOCC Live 2018