UK Premiere: The System (1979): Film Noir UK

Starring the Cantonese actor and martial artist Sek Kin (Enter the Dragon) as a mob consigliere and Pai Ying (Lady Kung Fu, A Touch of Zen) as a police detective, Peter Yung’s The System is about an incorruptible cop who uses an informant to expose a murderous payoff scheme between triad bosses and top officials in the colonial police force.

Yung got his start by photographing the underground drug scene in Hong Kong - and so he brings an authenticity to this gripping feature debut.

Collaborating with Yung were the young cinematographer Moon-Tong Lau who captures a lost Hong Kong of the 1970s by filming in seamy locations like the torn-down New World Hotel on the Tsim Sha Tsui harbourside and the neon-lit streets of Victoria; and assistant director Stanley Kwan, who would become a noted filmmaker in his own right with Center Stage, starring Maggie Cheung.

The restoration was…