56 years old, cinematographer

“Are you drunk now?” I ask my hard-drinking, woman-loving interviewee, who happens to be one of the most revered cinematographers in recent times. “Is the Pope Catholic?” replies Christopher Doyle, aka Du Ke-feng, who is currently in Ireland shooting a new project.

Australian-born Doyle travelled as a sailor and worked eccentric jobs around the world before shooting to international stardom in Hong Kong with his jaw-droppingly gorgeous camerawork on several of Wong Kar-wai’s films, Doyle’s frenetic style has probably found its roots in his distinctive impression of the city: “Like Hong Kong, my nuts need, anticipate, grow, and then revel in the mess.”

When asked how big a part Hong Kong plays in his idiosyncratic achievement, Doyle names his hero: “DJ Kulu, my co-president, [the] tea-drinking co-founder of Hong Kong’s most elegant Dirty Old Man’s Club” (our sources reveal that this club has in recent years involved Doyle and goateed veteran DJ Kulu sitting in the hot dog stand outside Drop nightclub in Central, checking out pretty ladies). He then continues, “although we have had a drop in membership [recently]… David Tang is offering a friendly takeover, or take-away...”

And what, in his opinion, is the Hong Kong film scene lacking? “We have to build an Imax porn co-op… site… club… As for foreplay in [my] work? I find riding the Star Ferry therapeutic.”

His answers might be cryptically offbeat, but there’s no doubting Doyle’s credentials. Having now firmly established himself on cinema’s world map with his equally lyrical non-WKW projects, such as Zhang Yimou’s Hero, Pen-Ek Ratanaruang’s Last Life in the Universe, and Gus Van Sant’s Paranoid Park, what does this dirty old man have to say to those idolising him as the greatest cinematographer working today? “They mustn't read Time Out,” Doyle says. It’s already too late, my friend. Edmund Lee