"I like to be different," Lau explains, seated in the Hong Kong offices of Milkyway Image, for which he is shooting the action romance True Hero. "I don't like to play the same character over and over again. Usually in Hong Kong, you don't get the choice: if you start off playing a cop, for instance, you tend to stay a cop. But I'm most satisfied when I'm doing something new, and, luckily, my producers have supported me in this." 

Lau, who trained in acting at Hong Kong's TVB (Television Broadcasts), has been making movies for over 10 years: so far, he's appeared in around 50. His best-known outings include the struggling sax player in 1993's romantic C'est La Vie, Mon Cherie; the priest who falls foul of temptation in Final Justice; and the cool-headed firefighter in the critically acclaimed action drama Lifeline. 

Last year saw him shine as an intense, implosive cop in Ringo Lam's slow- burning Full Alert, the Hong Kong film of 1997. "In that movie, I played Ringo," he laughs. "He's very lonely when he's making a movie!" 

C'est La Vie, Mon Cherie was the movie that made Lau a star, and he has fond memories of it. "I had a lot in common with the struggling sax player at the time," he says. As to its success, his chirps: "Well, all the girls like a sax player." 

Lau rarely plays villains, and his meanest character to date was an assassin in Johnny To's The Longest Nite. But he'd like the chance to get badder. "I'd really like to play a bad guy in the future, like Anthony Wong," he says, referring to Hong Kong's regular psycho-crazy actor. "Ringo Lam had me in mind for the bad guy in Full Alert. But then he realised that if I was the bad guy, I would have to die, and so I wouldn't be able to appear in the sequel. So instead, he got me to play the good guy." 

As for comedy, he still can't believe that the audiences find him funny. "Do you think I'm funny?" he calls across to his girlfriend, actress Amy Kwok. "Depends on the role," she rejoinders diplomatically. 

Lau is a big fan of The Godfather trilogy. These days, his English is so good, he can repeat every line of Part One, he says. Although he'd like to take a dramatic role in an American movie, he realises that his Hong Kong roots will probably lead to him being offered an action role first: "It's a good way to start," he says. 
Richard James Havis