By Glenn Dunks

Chan Tze Woon’s second feature is also his second about Hong Kong’s fight for independence. It follows Yellowing in 2016. Like many filmmakers working in non-fiction today, Chan incorporates actors and the process of moviemaking into Blue Island. This is a documentary that makes heavy use of recreations and performance, yet these are elements that are frequently weaved throughout rather seamlessly. It doesn’t always work, with some of Chan’s conceits coming and going at whim, but it becomes a smart choice.

For the story he’s trying to tell is one explicitly built around Hong Kong as an epicenter of street activism where one generation’s fighters have much to learn from those who came before. Where history becomes the present with far too much familiarity.