Shades of Life

Shades of Life
我們的天空

Shades of Life official poster
Genre Modern drama
Created by Hong Kong Television Broadcasts Limited
Written by Chan Man Keung
Cheung Hoi Hing
Leung Lap Yan
Starring Jack Wu
Elaine Yiu
Henry Yu
Zoie Tam
Theme music composer Damon Chui
Opening theme Shades of Life 我們的天空 by Hoffman Cheng, Ronald Law, Yao Bin, KT
Country of origin Hong Kong
Original language(s) Cantonese
No. of episodes 12
Production
Producer(s) Franklin Wong
Editor(s) Chan Man Keung
Cheung Hoi Hing
Leung Lap Yan
Yip Sai Choi
Location(s) Hong Kong
Camera setup Multi camera
Running time 45 minutes
Production company(s) TVB
Release
Original network Jade
HD Jade
Picture format 1080i (HDTV)
Original release 20 July 2014 (2014-07-20) – 12 October 2014 (2014-10-12)
External links
Website
Shades of Life
Traditional Chinese 我們的天空
Simplified Chinese 我们的天空
Literal meaning "Our Sky"

Shades of Life (Traditional Chinese: 我們的天空; literally "Our Sky") (Chinese: 我們的天空; Jyutping: ngo5 mun4 di1 tin1 hung1) is a 2014 Hong Kong modern drama produced by TVB, starring Jack Wu and Elaine Yiu. The series began airing on July 20, 2014 and was broadcast on the following Sundays at 9:00 p.m with 12 episodes in total.

The series centers around the Ko family, an modern Hong Kong family and the ordinary people they encounter. The series tells of the struggles and social issue of ordinary Hong Konger. Each episode does not continue on from the previous episode and each is a new standalone story.[1]

Main cast

Ko family

Tung family

Synopsis and cast

Episode 1: Succeed 望子成龍

Ko San Ting's classmate Dicky is the best in his class, always getting the highest grade on each test, but San Ting does not understand why Dicky always looks sad, tired and worried. On top of that Dicky is never satisfied with his test scores unless he gets a 100.

Episode 2: Same Root 同根生

While researching for his next article Ho Pan encounters new immigrant Wong Mei Fan and her preteen daughter Chan Bo Yee. Mei Fan and her daughter has high hopes when they arrive in Hong Kong from mainland China, but the two are soon faced with discrimination, prejudice and struggles.

Episode 3: Influence Life With Life 非常校長

Ko Ho Yen stands up for a teacher tutoring a student at a fast food restaurant, coincidentally the teacher becomes Ho Pan's next article. Ma Wui Jung was a former high school principal who gave up his steady income job to devote his full-time to tutoring less fortunate students. By following his dream he puts his marriage and family income at risk.

Episode 4: Sub-divided Hero 劏房英雄

Ho Pan sees an elderly man named Frankie on television being interviewed by news reporters during a government housing demonstration and tells his boss that he would like to do an magazine article on the elderly man. Frankie who was a police officer in his younger years speaks very well English but because of his gambling problems he has to resort to living in poor condition, illegal, sub-divided apartments during his elderly years. He gets by, by collecting the rents for the slum lord. Frankie meets Fung Bak another elderly man who is looking for cheap housing because his son's family has grew and their little apartment does not have enough room for all of them. Fung Bak thinking his separation from his family is temperately since they are on the waiting list for public housing lies to his family that he is living with a friend.

Episode 5: Winter's Fairy-tale 冬天的童話

Ho Pan interviews Cheung Huk Kau, a former student of his father who has a rags to riches story to tell. Huk Kau owns and manages a multi-million dollar garbage disposal and cleaning company but his beginnings were very humbled. Due to his mother's illness Huk Kau had to quit school and take over his mother's job full time as a cleaner. Through hard work and the help of his wife he was able to turn his one man company into one of Hong Kong's biggest cleaning companies.

Episode 6: Successor 接班人

Ho Pan and his assistant Chi Ho, encounter a car accident in the street, seeing Chi Ho hustle at the accident scene Pan thinks back to when Chi Ho first joined the magazine. Chi Ho overly protective mother Helen got him the job at the magazine and would sit by his desk at work to watch over him. As Chi Ho tags along with Ho Pan to cover stories for their articles he soon learns to become independent and a hard worker. At the same time Ho Pan interviews two recent college graduates who are overly ambitious and want to be on the top of the work force ladder right away.

Episode 7: Dream Dwelling 蝸居夢

Three of Ho Pan's friends, Hung Jik, Kwong Chi Hung and Fung Jun Yin are desperate to buy a flat for their marriages. Ho Pan refers them to his father in law Tung Fu Gwai, who likes to invest in real-estate and then re-sell it at a higher price. The three friends agree on the price and decide to go in together to buy Fu Gwai's flat. They each raise their share of the money by taking out their savings and borrowing from family, but on the day of the sale Fu Gwai raises the sale price because according to him recent real-estate price in Hong Kong has risen. With their dream of owning their own flat gone, Hung Jik decides to move to Singapore to be with his fiancee.

Episode 8: So Close, So Far 這麼近, 那麼遠

Episode 9: Father and I 公公與我

Episode 10: What Is Good 餘何是好

Episode 11: Sunset Warrior 夕陽戰士

Episode 12: Homeward Bound 歸去來兮

Viewership Ratings

EpisodeDateAverage ratings
1July 20, 201418
2July 27, 201424
3August 3, 201419
4August 10, 201420
5August 17, 201420
6August 24, 201420
August 31, 2014: No episode was aired due to
broadcast of the "2014 Miss Hong Kong Pageant"
7September 7, 201417
8September 14, 2014
9September 21, 2014
10September 28, 2014
11October 5, 2014
12October 12, 2014

Controversies

Shades of Life received over 1500 complaints in its 2nd week of airing. The series was slammed for depicting Hong Kong citizens in a negatively and inaccurate portrayal of stereotypes.[3] Also providing misleading information when depicting other country societies, such as episode 1 where it is mentioned about the difference between Hong Kong students and American students, one of the characters ask "why Hong Kong students carry backpacks to school when in the United States students does not carry backpacks because everything they need is already provided by the school".[4]

References

  1. TVB’s “Shades of Life” Reflects Hong Kong Society. Retrieved 8-3-2014
  2. cast info. Retrieved 8-3-2014
  3. The Migrant’s Tale: TVB and the personal made political. Retrieved 8-3-2014
  4. "Shades of Life" criticised for distorting Hong Kong's image. Retrieved 8-3-2014

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Saturday, March 12, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.