The awakening of modern sensibilities across Asia in the last century is often marked by the revolt against the suffocating morality of feudal orders. In China and Hong Kong, this is frequently expressed in literature and film as reactions against arranged marriages, resulting in youths taking bold and even drastic actions to win the freedom to love. Yet the notion of desire, especially that of women, is often avoided. A rare exception is Cecile Tang's The Arch (1970), a film whose formal accomplishments are informed by its audacious treatment of the chastity issue.

Bound by Chastity Rules is somewhat a Korean version of The Arch, made eight years earlier. It's the story of a young widow (Choi Eun-hee, director Shin Sang-ok's wife), who is under pressure to remain chaste for the rest of her life, especially because her mother-in-law has endured the same fate and has been honored with the Arch of Chastity. Things get complicated when the widow falls in love with a worker...

The film won high regards locally and internationally, winning three awards at the 2nd Daejongang Film Festival, including Best Film, and was invited to the 13th Berlin International Film Festival.

The restoration of Bound by Chastity Rules was a cooperative project of the Korean Film Archive and Hfr-Lab, a lab that specializes in DI (digital intermediate) technology. Three 16mm prints were used for the project. Although all three suffered severe and diverse damages, the restoration team had the benefit of picking the best images and sound from each print. Scratches, dust and other blemishes were removed by digital, analog and manual methods in a process that took four months.

6/11

(Sun)

2:00pm *

Cinema, Hong Kong Film Archive

* Post-screening talk with Kinnia Yau