Sorry, I Love You Film Screening & Interview with Cast and Director

"Sorry, I Love You" directed by Larry Yang is the Chinese remake of the well known Korean drama of the same name produced in 2004. With a few changes, the 16 episodes have been shortened into the film that opened on October 28 in China and Hong Kong.

Promotional photo for the film.

Today's Chinese Film Festival had a special screening at the 42nd Street AMC theater as well as press interviews and opened Q&A session with the director Larry Yang and two actors, Vivian Dawson and Jade Lin. Their interviews gave us an insight of meanings behind the film.

Vivian demonstrated with his fists the many action and fight scenes.

Vivian described the 40 days of filming as very tiring and cold. He wore a coat but only had a cardigan underneath, but Jade appreciated how thoughtful the director was to their conditions. When the scenes were done, he would have people rush to cover the actors and actresses with coats. Since there were lots of training and filming involved, Vivian said he ran on 3 hours of sleep. Sounds like the tiring schedule I had during my college life! But with that you can see the complete dedication the whole crew had to the movie.

They were asked to pose together for a photo, and I thought this was such a cute reaction, showing the closeness and importance of having a comfortable relationship between the actor and director. They got along well and joked together as well.

When asked what qualities Larry was looking for when casting the male lead Wu He, he responded someone with the Korean pop culture feel (probably to reflect on the original drama), elegance, innocence and grew up overseas. All of which Vivian embodies. 

As this was his first major acting role, both Larry and Jade applauded him on his acting and smarts. Vivian admitted he didn't cry for 18 years, and his first scene he had to cry. To get into character, used method acting to stay in character for the 40 days. Even after the film was over, because of the emotional identification he had with the character, it was hard to stop being sad he admitted.

Elegantly poised Jade Lin during press interviews.

Jade, on the other hand, said she used her older brother to help her out on crying and depressing scenes. During audition, she would imagine if the situation was in real life with her brother, making it a really natural act, landing her the role. Jade and Vivian commented how they started to feel like real siblings as they went on, making it easier.

They really had a brother and sister bond!

The director mainly wanted to present to us a good movie that viewers would want to finish. They don't have to shed tears, it's mainly up to each viewer's emotional level and connection to the characters and story. He admitted that although some parts of movies were changed from the original, he copied the exact ending of the original. He knew this was a beloved drama, so he wanted to play tribute to it.

Larry wanted to bring this film to New York to watch together with his mother. When the microphone was handed to her, she gave a tear jerking speech on how he was able to accomplish it. Upon graduating with a bachelor degree in Economics, he decided to enter Beijing Film Academy to chase his dream of directing. He wrote up his idea of "Sorry, I Love You" and asked companies if they would buy it to start production. As he was a new director, he failed to receive financial support for his dream. His mother decided to pull out all their savings and told him to bring his dream come true, and come back to show her the film. Thus with the support of his mother, he was really able to just that but he first had to buy his script/idea back. I thought it was so sweet and amazing the love his mother has for him and his dreams.

Larry's dream directing job is to do a war film. He loves the action that partakes in it, but he knows he needs a huge production to accomplish that. So he will wait until he's a more seasoned director to debut such a movie. I hope he will be able to reach that goal of his!

The press requested Vivian to show his modeling side.

Although I missed out on the whole movie since I was listening to their interviews and taking photos, I watched the ending. The dramatic bloody action scenes and dark mood was a new update to the original romantic yet depressing mood of the drama. From what I saw, I really love how it was directed and panning of the cameras. I also enjoyed that he calls the leading actress "bobble head" as that's something I do :P

She was so cute, kept posing for all of us who wanted to snap a photo of her.

Don't really want to stand next to a pretty girl... haha but I wanted a photo with her! So beautiful!!

Before Q&A I asked to have a photo taken together, and he remembered afterwards! So tall!!
Photo credit Peshean Zhang

I felt bad that they looked tired from jet lag, but they still manage to smile and take photos with all the fans. All the crew of the film was so down to earth and nice! When asked about having many female admirers in both the movie and real life, he humbly asked "Really, do I?". Then he went on to saying, he has a few close female figures, because quality over quantity. Nicely put!

Film Plot from New York Chinese Film Festival site:

With only six months to live and nothing to live for in Vancouver, Walker decided to go back to China, where he was born and adopted from when he was very little, and go look for his biological parents and twin sister (Chu). Walker knew that it wasn’t going to be easy to find them, but everything changed when he ran into the girl (Encai) who he’d saved from a few street thugs several months back. In Walker’s imagation his biological parents must have abondoned them due to poverty or life difficulties when they were babies, yet when he stood in front of his mother’s giant luxious mansion, he could not help but start to hate his mother Hui of her heartless. In order to revenge his mother and find ways to get closer, he accepted the offer to be Trey’s (Hui’s adopted son) personal driver. At the same time he tried to find his twin sister with the help from Encai, yet they started to fall in love with each other very quickly. With only six months to live, there are a lot of decisions Walker has to make to make his loved ones’ life complete.