Chinese Mafia [Triads] in Film Production

CHARLES HEUNG WAH KEUNG  Biography     Filmography     Gallery      Other names : 向华强 Charles Heung Charles W.K. Heung Heung Wa Keung Heung Wa Keung Heung Wah Keung Shiang Hwa Chiang Xiang4 Hua1 Jiang4 Birthdate : 16/12/1948 Nationality : Hong Kong Workplace : Hong Kong Activities : Producer (20), Executive producer (9), Associate producer (1), Actor (29), Brief appearance (1), Presenter (94) BIOGRAPHY Charles Heung’s brother Jimmy is a top triad figure in HK – but he is considered a “good triad”. Both of these brothers apparently truly love film. It’s right out of a Damon Runyon story. Charles is a producer as well but has also been acting in films since the early 70s. His brother Jimmy stuck to producing and some of his many films are the God of Gambler series, Casino Raiders... Rumor has it that the film True Mob Story with Andy Lau and Alex Fong was based to some degree on their lives - though Charles denied it. At some point a few years ago the brothers split and went their own ways with Jimmy running the Wins production company and Charles getting China Star - which is now the most powerful film company in HK. His father, Heung Chin, was the head of all Triads in Hong Kong. However, he was expelled from Hong Kong in the late 1950s and fled to Taiwan. His eldest brother, Heung Wah Yim, the Godfather of Sun Yee On, was sentenced to ten years imprisonment by H.R.H. Sir Ti-Liang Yang, the chief justice, in 1987. However, he was released two years later since his lawyer was able to provide sufficient proof of his 'innocence'. Sir Ti-Liang, a very respectable elderly judge (also the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the HKU), was enraged, and on the very day when Heung was released, he publicly condemned him at the court, calling him a scoundrel and a 'dirty rat which dwelled in the drains'. After this incident, the Heungs stayed out of the business and Charles has always pretended that he was a normal citizen. Charles tried to keep himself away from his family's triad image and so he broke with Jimmy in 1995,as Jimmy's style of negotiating business too closely resembled that of a Triad member. Later in 2000, when his brother Heung Wah Po was arrested for setting fire to his own apartment (after quarreling with his mistress), Charles refused to help him and publicly announced that he did not know his brothers well since they were given birth by different mothers.