Beyond the Dream

The script of this film can be traced back to 2006. Director Kiwi Chow returned to school as a part-time lecturer two years after he was graduated from Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts. At that time, a student talked about the story of filming the story of psychiatric patients, which inspired him to start information gathering, and found that it was very difficult for them to fall in love, so it made him to created a 30-minute short film, named "Upstairs".[7] The short film was well received and won several local and international film festival awards, including the Special Award for Young Film Art at the 2nd Student Television Festival which held in Warsaw, Poland, the Grand Prize of the 2006 Kodak Cinematography Competition (Hong Kong Region), the Silver Award of 2006 Hong Kong Independent Short Film and Video Competition (Open Category). The impressive achievements encouraged him to extend the story into a feature film, Beyond the Dream. However, it was unfortunately it had not been favored by investors, and the result is nothing. A few years before the film started, the director co-founded "Lightseed Films" with Felix Tsang, another producer and screenwriter. They cooperated to complete several scripts. Chow suddenly hooked the movie that have been shelved for years since they're failed to find funds to start filming. They made further revisions to "Beyond the Dream" and later obtained government funding successfully.[8]

"Beyond the Dream" was received HK $1.2 million through the Film Development Fund, which accounting for 20% of the total cost. The director had directed a film with sensitive theme, Ten Years, and some investors have indicated that they would not invest in his film, which made him to face difficulties in raising funds. The film was released on the big screen because of some benefactor had donated generously as they don't want to witness the decline of Hong Kong-produced films.[9]

The director Chow found that Terrance Lau performed in a different way within the audition, he's presents a Psychosis patient who seemed to be no different from the normal person, which coincides with his message. As for the heroine, because of someone had introduced her to the director, and the director had seen her performance at "My Very Short Marriage" and thought that she was very refreshing. She plays a professional role in the TV series, which is quite similar to the setting of this movie. In addition, combined with her looks like a highly educated person and her natural performance in audition, those various factors made her the best choice for the heroine.[7]

Most of the scenes in this film were filmed at Tuen Mun, Hong Kong. however it was not arranged by the director deliberately. When he discussed with the screenwriter about the character and background of the male protagonist, Chow believed that he was a character with low self-esteem, introverted, and avoids crowds, which was not suitable for living in the city center, but in a more remote location, so it made Tuen Mun as one of the options.

The music was done by Tu Du-Chih.

2021年年初設置在屯門碼頭海濱長廊「幻愛橋」的節日裝飾，雖然被《幻愛》導演周冠威批評觀感不好，但成為市民拍攝熱點[21]

The background was set in Tuen Mun, and the filming locations were considered to be very romantic, which like thee Japanese style painting,[22] and attracting the audiences to revisit the filming scenes in groups.[23]

Affected by the COVID-19 epidemic, there is a shortage of international blockbusters during June and July, and the release of "Beyond the Dream" made Hong Kong-produced films to fill this window period indirectly. "My Prince Edward" and "Suk Suk" were officially released subsequently, the media collectively referred to the above three films as "3 Treasures of Golden Scene". The "3 Treasures of Golden Scene" not only have their own characteristics, but also arouse different audiences' re-attention to Hong Kong-produced films. It can be regarded as an Indian summer for the Hong Kong films. Those three films were very popular among Hong Kong people, and a variety of peripheral products, such as postcards, novels, theme coffee, etc. were launched rarely in Hong Kong film history.[24][25]

The male and female protagonists had known each other before filming, but they were not familiar with each other. They gradually fell in love with each other during the filming and became a real couple.[26] In the interview, the male lead expressed that there had a scene was filmed at a light rail station, the emotions he released were very surging and intense which made him exhausted, but he felt that the encouragement by the female protagonist constantly, so made him love.[27]

Kowloon Motor Bus had uploaded a derivative poster on its Facebook page, which was of derivative from the film, the promotional phrase of the poster was "I don't mind—don't you?". The title was "Sit Down", urging passengers to remember to sit still while the bus was moving, and hold the handrail tightly while standing, and wear a mask most importantly to avoid fines. The poster was warmly welcomed by netizens.[28]