Jimmy Lui was born in the South, but is not a redneck. Like any good Southerner, if he doesn’t have anything nice to say about someone he won’t say anything at all. And like any good Chinese person, he uses chopsticks to eat and knows kung fu, among other martial arts. He considers himself a warrior anarchist.
Although he was never a Star Wars fan like other kids his age, Jimmy loved movies. While he excelled at science and math in school, Jimmy decided to squander his potential and pursue a career in filmmaking. He managed to earn a Bachelors of Art’s degree in Cinema-Television from the prestigious and expensive USC School of Cinematic Arts in 1999 while incurring no student debt. It can be done Millennials. While in school, he worked internships in development at Blue Tulip Productions (Jan De Bont) and Imagine Television (Ron Howard and Brian Grazer).
Upon graduating, Jimmy found himself working alongside two of his childhood idols Sammo Hung and Jackie Chan on the movie The Medallion. Having the remarkable fortune of having the legendary Sammo Hung as a mentor, Jimmy fell into a career working as a fight choreographer, fight trainer, stuntman and stunt coordinator in the U.S., Chinese and Korean film industries.
Jimmy was an Executive Producer on the dreadful Chinese language kung fu film Kung Fu Man. He apologizes to anyone who paid money to watch it. Jimmy also co-wrote (uncredited) Keanu Reeves’s directorial debut Man of Tai Chi. He has nothing to say about Keanu.
Jimmy also writes, directs and produces his own projects. His post-apocalypic vampire script Blood won the 2010 Page International Screenwriting Awards Gold Prize for Best Science Fiction screenplay. Blood was also named in the 2010 edition of The Blood List.
Jimmy wrote and directed the 14 minute short film When We Meet Again. This film about true love, free choice and parallel universes was an official selection of the Anthem Film Festival, IndieWise Film Festival and played at the TCL Chinese Theatre as part of the HollyShorts Film Festival.
Jimmy also wrote and directed The Hopping Dead, a 3 minute horror comedy about Chinese hopping vampires called jiangshi. The Hopping Dead premiered at the famous Grauman’s Chinese Theatre (now called TCL Chinese Theatre) as part of HollyShorts. Jimmy is now hard at work on a feature length jiangshi film titled Wong of the Dead, coming soon to a theatre near you.