Kim Hye-ja in Mother.
Bong Joon-ho’s unusual drama-thriller Mother received top honors at the 2010 Asian Film Awards. Hosted by model and veejay Lisa S., the event took place on March 22, during the Hong Kong Film Festival, at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center on Monday evening.
Mother, the tale of a devoted mother who’ll stop at nothing to prove her mentally handicapped son is innocent of a heinous crime, was chosen as the Best Picture of 2009. In the title role, South Korean superstar Kim Hye-ja was voted Best Actress, while Bong and Park Eun-kyo took home the award for Best Screenplay.
The Best Director was Lu Chuan for the historical Chinese drama City of Life and Death, about the Nanjing Massacre of 1937 during which hundreds of thousands of Chinese civilians were killed by invading Japanese soldiers. City of Life and Death also earned Cao Yu the Best Cinematographer Award.
Wang Xueqi was voted Best Actor for his performance as an early 20th-century businessman who provides financial aid for Sun Yat-sen’s revolutionary movement: which led to the formation of modern China: in Teddy Chan’s Hong Kong-made actioner Bodyguards and Assassins.
Nicholas Tse won as Best Supporting Actor for his self-sacrificing rickshaw puller in the same movie. Out of its six nominations, those were the only two in which Bodyguards and Assassins came out on top.
The Best Newcomer was Ng Meng-hui for her wealthy teen having an illicit online relationship with a 23-year-old (Tien You Chui) in the psychological-social drama At the End of Daybreak. Ho Yuhang’s South Korean-Malaysian-Hong Kong co-production also earned Wai Ying-hung (a.k.a. Kara Hui), playing the young man’s working-class single mother, the Best Supporting Actress trophy.
The Asian Film Awards’ first Best Costume Designer prize was presented by Donatella Versace to Christian Lacroix, Anne Dunsford and Wang Chia-Hui for Tsai Ming-liang’s French-Taiwanese Face (above). Another Face victory: the movie was much praised for its look (though not for its storyline): was in the Best Production Designer category: the winners were Alain-Pascal Housiaux, Patrick Dechesne and Lee Tian-Jue.
The award for Outstanding Contribution to Asian Cinema went to Chinese veteran Zhang Yimou, among whose credits are Raise the Red Lantern, To Live, and Hero, while Bollywood legend Amitabh Bachchan was given the Lifetime Achievement Award.
“In a world that is fast disintegrating,” Bachchan declared, “I believe cinema is one medium that brings all of us together in love, in friendship, and in cooperation.”
John Woo received a special award for being the top-grossing filmmaker at the 2009 box office. Woo’s Red Cliff is reportedly the highest-grossing Chinese production ever.
Asian Film Awards 2010: Winners & nominations
Best Film
Bodyguards and Assassins (Hong Kong)
City of Life and Death (China)
Lola (Philippines)
* Mother (South Korea)
Parade (Japan)
No Puedo Vivir Sin Ti (Taiwan)Best Director
Bong Joon-ho – Mother
* Lu Chuan – City of Life and Death
Asghar Farhadi – About Elly (Iran)
Brillante Mendoza – Lola
Sono Sion – Love Exposure (Japan)
Yonfan – Prince of Tears (Hong Kong | Taiwan)Best Actress
Bae Doona – Air Doll (Japan)
* Kim Hye-ja – Mother
Li Bingbing – The Message (China)
Sandrine Pinna – Yang Yang (Taiwan)
Matsu Takako – Villon’s Wife (Japan)Best Actor
Huang Bo – Cow (China)
Matsumoto Hitoshi – Symbol (Japan)
Song Kang-ho – Thirst (South Korea)
Asano Tadanobu – Villon’s Wife
* Wang Xueqi – Bodyguards and AssassinsBest Supporting Actor
Eita – Dear Doctor (Japan)
Huang Xiaoming – The Message
Tou Chung-hua – The Warrior and the Wolf (China)
* Nicholas Tse – Bodyguards and Assassins
Won Bin – MotherBest Supporting Actress
Sakura Ando – A Crowd of Three (Japan)
Ry?ko Hirosue – Villon’s Wife
* Kara Hui – At the End of Daybreak (Malaysia | Hong Kong | South Korea)
Kim Kkot-bi – Breathless (South Korea)
Yan Ni – Cow (China)Best Newcomer
* Ng Meng Hui – At the End of Daybreak
Li Yuchun – Bodyguards and Assassins
Sonam Kapoor – Delhi 6 (India)
Kim Sae-ron – A Brand New Life (South Korea)
Zhu Xuan – Prince of TearsBest Screenplay
About Elly – Asghar Farhadi
Adrift – Phan Dang Di (Vietnam)
Like You Know It All – Hong Sang-soo (South Korea)
* Mother – Bong Joon-ho & Park Eun-kyo
Written By – Wai Ka-fai & Au Kin-yee (Hong Kong)Best Cinematography
Adrift – Ly Thai Dung
* City of Life and Death – Cao Yu
Thirst – Chung Chung-hoon
Vengeance – Cheng Siu-keung (Hong Kong)
Yang Yang – Jake PollockBest Film Editing
Crazy Racer – Tang Hua, Zhang Yifan &d Du Yuan (China)
* Karaoke – Lee Chatametikool (Malaysia)
Lola – Kats Serraon
Mother – Moon Sae-kyung
Overhead – Kong Chi-leung & Chan Chi-wai (Hong Kong)Best Music
Adrift – Hoang Ngoc Dai
City of Life and Death – Liu Tong
Fish Story – Liu Tong (Japan)
Running Turtle – Jang Young-gyu & Lee Byung-hoon (South Korea)
* Vengeance – Lo Ta-YuBest Production Design
Bodyguards and Assassins – Kenneth Mak
* Face – Alain-Pascal Housiaux & Patrick Deche (Taiwan)
The Message – Xiao Haihang
Thirst – Ryu Seong-hie
Yatterman – Hayashida Yuji (Japan)Best Costume Design
Bodyguards and Assassins – Dora Ng
* Face – Christian Lacroix, Anne Dunsford & Wang Chia-Hui
Goemon – Tina Kalivas & Vaughan Alexander (Japan)
The Sword with No Name – Shim Hyun-soeb (South Korea)
The Warrior and the Wolf – Wada EmiBest Visual Effects
Crazy Racer – Wang Jianxiong, Jimmy Chen & Li Liping
Goemon – Fujita Takuya & Nozaki Koji
The Storm Warriors – Ng Yuen-fai, Tam Kai-kwan & Chas Chau Chi-shing (Hong Kong)
Symbol – Seshita Hiroyuki
* Thirst – Yi ZeonhyoungLifetime Achievement Award
Amitabh Bachchan (India)Asian Film Award for Outstanding Contribution to Asian Cinema
Zhang Yimou (China)Asian Film Award for 2009’s Top-Grossing Film Director
John Woo – Red Cliff II (China)
Golden Kite Awards 2010: Don’t Burn tops Vietnam’s top film prize
Veteran filmmaker Dang Nhat Minh’s Don’t Burn, adapted from the book Dang Thuy Tram’s Diary, won six awards at Vietnam’s 8th Golden Kite Awards, held at the Friendship Palace in Hanoi on Sunday, March 14.
Don’t Burn won awards for Best Feature, Best Actress (newcomer Minh Huong), Best Director, Best Production Design, Best Sound Effects, and the Audience Award.
Don’t Burn starts out in the spring of 2005, when an older woman living in Hanoi receives a diary. The diary chronicles the painful link between Vietnam and the United States as told by a young doctor (Huong) working at a National Liberation Front hospital from 1968 until her death two years later. Several months ago, Don’t Burn won the Golden Lotus Award at the country’s National Film Festival. It was also Vietnam’s submission for the 2010 Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award.
The Golden Kite’s Best Actor winner was Trinh Hoi for his film debut, 14 Days, the story of a Vietnamese expatriate who spends his two-week vacation in his home country, which is vastly different from what he remembered.
Bui Thac Chuyen’s Adrift, winner of the FIPRESCI Prize at the 2009 Venice Film Festival, received the Golden Kite for Best Cinematography (Ly Thai Dung).
“Asian Film Awards 2010: Mother” notes
Asian Film Awards website.
Kim Hye-ja Mother image: Magnolia Pictures.
*last modified in January 2026.