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Emperor

96 minutes | 17 or older | 2008 | Malaysia

Foreign / IndieFlix Official Selections / Thrillers

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Tagline

A murder mystery wrapped in a fast paced Asian triad thriller.

Synopsis

The Malaysian underworld is at war with the Hong Kong Triads, an invisible feud kept from public eyes. But when a young girl gets murdered, the case blows up in the headlines. Everyone is a suspect. The Malaysian Police, and their long-time understanding with the underworld, gets dragged into public scrutiny. What follows is a trail drenched in blood, suspense and betrayal.

Director's Statement

It was December 2006 when I decided to stop waiting to be discovered. and take control over my filmmaking career. I was a foreigner in Asia with no script, no actors, no crew and no money. But I decided to make a movie anyway. I started with a short film on a shoe string budget, approaching the project as a practice run for bigger projects. We shot "Unsecured Loan" in 2007 with Malaysian talents and crew, and it helped me establish my own method of guerilla filmmaking. By the end of 2007, I had a full cast and crew ready for my next venture. One of the luckiest breaks for me was the newfound collaborative partnership with Adrian Lai of The Factory Movie Studio, who came onboard during the production of "Unsecured Loan". He brings the skill-sets which completes our team such as Cinematography, Sound Design and staying calm when I lose it (on top of Financial Intelligence, which being genetically Chinese naturally bestows upon him).

'Unsecured Loan" helped us decide to make "Emperor", a gangster movie with a twist, which I affectionately pitch as a "Johnny To movie meets The Usual Suspects". It is a compelling story with strong visual language, a manageable genre of film to make as one's first.

It was around the time Braham Singh was winding up his research for the novel "Emperor" and putting it to paper. The story was perfect for us. He was excited to adapt it for the screen and we had our first full length feature film story.

  • Directed by
    Juliane Block
  • Written by
    Braham Singh
  • Produced by
    Adrian Lai
    Juliane Block
  • Emperor Website
Directed by: Juliane Block
Written by: Braham Singh
Produced by: Adrian Lai
Juliane Block

Cast

Thomas Li: Sam Yap
Victor Cheung Ka Ting: Adrian Lai
Li Poh Sin: Alfred Loh
Gilbert Guo: Meng Kitt Wong
Rosebud: Cheryl Lee
Felix Cheung: Sean Yap
Sujata: Nina Sharil Khan
Inspector Ravindran: Vikneshwaran Balasundran
Dato' Zakariah: JD Menon

Crew

Editor: Chilee Kung
Cinematographer: Aleko Oneg
Music: Hoong Bee Lim
Music: Yuri Wong
Production Designer: Aliff Zulkifli

Emperor is penned by an Indian, based on ancient Chinese history, directed by a German, produced by a Malaysian and has a cast made up of every major ethnic group in South East Asia. The big challenge therefore was language, or rather the reconciliation of multiple languages. In dealing with the multilingual smorgasbord of English, German, Cantonese, Mandarin, Hokkien, Malay and Tamil, we paid careful attention to retain meaning that could have been lost in translation, without compromising on the authenticity of their deliveries. (This is going to take some getting used to by international audiences but English subtitles help.)

  • Juliane Block

    Director

    Juliane Block