Director Andrew Law, famed for the “Infernal Affairs” films, recently completed his first foray into Hollywood with the forthcoming movie, “The Flock,” starring Richard Gere. Locally, he’s currently filming “Confessions of Pain” with Tony Leung and Shu Qi. With “The Departed,” the Hollywood remake of “Infernal Affairs,” out this week, he talks to Scott Murphy

I remember my childhood. It was spent in the New Territories in Yuen Long.

My father worked on Hong Kong Island in construction when I was a child. He would set up buildings, that kind of thing. Every summer holiday I would go there for about two weeks. It was the country boy going to the urban city. I would think “Wow! Good food!”

There was a lot of farmland in the New Territories. I would steal vegetables.

 I’m lucky that my classmates’ father was a theater manager. I forget the name of the first film that I saw, but I remember it was a war story. It was Germany. There were aliens. Even now, I love that kind of movie.

When we were boys there were so many things that my parents said to me about the police. They said, “A good guy cannot be a policeman.” At that time, Hong Kong was very much a triad society. I think this inspired me with the idea that some triad members could go into the police force.

In high school, I didn’t want to study my books. At that time I was playing the guitar, singing. I was Catholic then, so I could go to church every week and learn guitar in church.

Without church, maybe I would have become a triad.

I’ve got six bothers and sisters, so my parents didn’t have enough time to concentrate on all of us. This gave me a chance to concentrate on my camera. I tried to develop film myself, set up a darkroom in my house.

As a child and in high school I didn’t like Hong Kong because it was a British colony. The British people controlled the Chinese people. That was my feeling. At that moment, I was thinking, “No matter what, you’re Chinese.”

When I was a camera assistant, I worked at Shaw Studios. I was holding the camera for about half a year and thought, “I must be a good cameraman.” I don’t know why, but I felt born to do it.

The tempo has to be fast. I was not that patient with actors. I would always shoot and push, faster, faster. Hong Kong is very fast. I want those kinds of things in my work.

I was shooting a movie called “Mr. Vampire.” One day I walked up the stairs and saw a lady standing in front of the offices outside. I thought, “This girl is so beautiful.”

After a few years, I met her again working on Wong Kar-wai’s movie, “As Tears Go By.” At that moment we started a romance. I had a girlfriend. She had a boyfriend. But sometimes it’s fate. We ran away and lived together.

We’ve been married 14 years. We have four kids: three sons, one daughter.

“The Godfather” is my favorite film. At that time, it didn’t look like the Italian mafia. It looked like the Hong Kong mafia. During my childhood, so many of my classmates became triads.

“Young And Dangerous” was one of my most important films. It made me more popular. The box office was good and I started my first company with some partners as a result.

I run away from politics, but “Infernal Affairs” is quite political. I think it’s the only movie talking about the handover.

Martin Scorsese is my idol and I’m happy that he made my movie. Of course, I want the film to be good so more people know about “Infernal Affairs.” But we couldn’t have control of “The Departed.” They just gave me the script back and said, “You’re welcome to give comments.” I know nothing about the rest.

People told me they are changing a lot of things, but I can’t control that. But Matt Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio are good actors.

Hong Kong is still a base for me. When I shoot a movie in the US and come back here, I feel very comfortable. When I walk off the plane I feel good. This airport is the best one in the world.

The new movie I’m making is called “Confessions Of Pain.” It’s about Hong Kong.

One day, I want to shoot a sex story and make the audience cry.

Good movies make me happiest. Family and good company too. I spend a lot of time at my company so I hope my family understands.

I want to have a studio one day like Sir Run Run Shaw. You can have 10 movies a year, doing different things. We need a studio. As one director, you can’t shoot so many things. In Hong Kong, the golden time was in 1981. We had Golden Harvest, Shaw Studio. Every year we had 300 movies. Now we don’t have anything like that.