Hong Kong director Wong Kar-wai reveals the first NFT of unseen footage from his career-defining 2000 film, ‘In The Mood For Love’.
Here is everything you need to know:
- While Wong Kar Wai’s long-in-development Blossoms Shanghai will finally see the light of day hopefully next year, the director has been going back to his past works with a Coppola-like interest.
- With the post-production changes he made for the new Standard clips of his work, the Hong Kong master is taking an unexpected route to unveil never-before-seen footage from In the Mood for Love.
- This October, Wong has created his first-ever NFT. The NFT short film “contains rare footage starring Tony Leung and Maggie Cheung as characters utterly different from the iconic lovers in the original film,” the description reads.
- “All creation originates from a single thought,” Wong said.
- “The “Humane King Sutra” describes that every thought consists of ninety flashes, and within each flash lives nine hundred sparks and extinguishment, he added.
- Wong has turned unseen footage from the film into a non-fungible token, titled In The Mood For Love – Day One. And his production company, Jet Tone Films, was revealed on September 6.
- Jet-Tone added it would be auctioned off via Sotheby’s, making it the first Asian film NFT offered by the art broker.
- Sotheby’s notes that the short film reveals co-leads “Tony Leung and Maggie Cheung as characters utterly different from the iconic lovers in the original film.”
- As part of Sotheby’s Modern Art Sales alongside paintings, jewelry, and more, the NFT will be traded on October 9 in Hong Kong.
- The auctions continue a retrospective look at Wong’s legacy that began in 2020 with a 4K restoration of his films, including the 1994 film Chungking Express and the 2004 sci-fi drama 2046.
Now Wong is working on his first television series, Blossoms Shanghai. While a release date has yet to be announced, a first-look teaser was unveiled in June.
