Johnnie To

1972-1986: TVB and The Enigmatic Case

In 1972, after graduating from high school, To began his career as a messenger for the Hong Kong television station TVB, when he was 17. From there To moved up the ladder, working as an executive producer and director for TV shows starting in 1973. To was 25 when he released his first film in 1980, The Enigmatic Case, which was produced by a Chinese left-wing studio. The wuxia film was a box-office failure, and To returned to working in television. In 1983, he directed and screen-wrote the critically acclaimed The Legend of the Condor Heroes, a dramatised TV series based on the martial art novel of the same name by Jin Yong. In 1984, he directed the series The Duke of Mount Deer, also based on Jin Yong's novel The Deer and the Cauldron. As To was absent from Hong Kong feature filmmaking between 1980 to 1986, he did not contribute to the first wave of the Hong Kong New Wave cinematic renaissance.

1986-1997: Comedies and commercial success

To returned to feature films in 1986, joining Cinema City Enterprises to release the comedy Happy Ghost III. In 1988, he co-directed The Big Heat, his first action movie. The end of the 1980s saw some of To's biggest commercial successes, the vast majority of which were comedies. His 1988 film The Eighth Happiness was that year's highest-grossing movie. While working as an assistant TV director during the Shaw Studios era, he directed the comedy All About Ah-Long (1989), which starred Chow Yun-fat and became one of the biggest box office hits that year. During this period, To also directed the films Casino Raiders II (1991), The Heroic Trio (1993), Executioners (1993), and Loving You (1995), establishing himself as a commercially successful filmmaker.

To also directed Stephen Chow's early comedies including Justice, My Foot! (1992) and The Mad Monk (1993), however his experience working with Chow on the latter film soured his view on filmmaking, and To considered leaving the business altogether.

In 1996, To and frequent collaborator Wai Ka-fai formed Milkyway Image, a production house specialising in cost-efficient independent films made by To and Wai, as well as their frequent collaborators from Law Wing-cheung to scriptwriter Yau Nai-hoi.

To decided to emigrate to Canada in 1990 after the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre. He is a Canadian citizen and holds a Canadian passport, however he has stated that he does not want to leave Hong Kong until he "cannot accept the political situation here any longer". To stated that he does not identify as Chinese, but as a Canadian and a Hong Konger.

When asked if he was willing to work in mainland China as a filmmaker, To emphasised that he was willing to work in China as long as he was free to do what he wished, but that he would not make a film that he did not himself believe in. To added that he did not accept communism, citing a lack of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion, and said that he could not accept China's claim of being a democratic country. He stated "Many Chinese producers came to talk with me and asked me to make a movie in China. I said, ‘Only if I can do everything my way and make the decisions – will you allow me to do this?’ No – they don’t want this."