Controversial movie 'Ten Years', which is centered on the anxieties over Hong Kong's future, has won the top film award in the city.
The movie, which portrays the state of the semi autonomous Hong Kong in the year 2015, was received enthusiastically by audiences in the city despite anger in mainland China.
The Global Times, Chinese communist party mouthpiece, had denounced the movie as "totally absurd" and a "virus of the mind".
The low-budget movie was banned in China but ran to packed audiences in Hong Kong. The independent movie, which had only a short general release in the city, angered China by depicting scenes like Hong Kong citizens being persecuted for speaking their native tongue Cantonese.
Another scene that rankled China was children in uniform policing adults, a stark reminder of the fearful Cultural Revolution that unfolded in China during 1966-76.
Yet another shot in the movie is that of a protester self-immolating outside the British consulate.
The five-part film was directed by different people, and each vignette focuses on different aspects of the resident's fears about their future under Chinese rule.
Set in 2025, the movie revolves around the hypothetical scenario of political gangs persecuting Hong Kong residents.
"Ten Years exposed the fear of Hong Kong people. It also "provided Hong Kong people and us a chance to show that we have no fear", Chow Kwun-wai, a co-director of the film, said after it bagged the award for the best film.
Great Britain handed over Hong Kong to China in 1997 but the city dwellers have been worried over a rapid erosion of freedoms enshrined in the handover deal in the last two decades.
"The meaning of this prize is that it shows Hong Kong still has hope. It reminds us that we could have courage to be creative. I would like to thank everyone who has watched it," film's producer Andrew Choi said, according to the Guardian.
