Ang Lee's "Lust" gallops away with 7 Golden Horses

By Doug Young

TAIPEI (Reuters) - Ang Lee's steamy "Lust, Caution" trotted off as the big winner on Saturday at the 2007 Golden Horse awards, the most coveted Chinese-language film prizes, picking up seven honours including best director and best film.

Despite its low profile in the West, the Golden Horse is a spectacular occasion for the Chinese-speaking world, with top talent from Taiwan, Hong Kong and China turning out each year for the red-carpet event in Taipei.

"Lust, Caution," the favourite going into the star-studded event, also helped Lee win the award for outstanding Taiwanese filmmaker of the year.

"This is for the lack of respect that Taiwan has gotten in the past," Lee said backstage, after getting the outstanding Taiwanese filmmmaker award. "My point of view, my style are all from Taiwan. So I'm very much representing Taiwan."

"Lust" also won best leading actor honours for Hong Kong star Tony Leung Chiu Wei.

"Lust," Lee's most prominent Chinese-language film since "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon", won the Golden Lion at the Venice film festival, and had the advantage of much stronger publicity than its rivals.

The awards feature mostly films from Taiwan and Hong Kong. In addition to Lee and Leung, luminaries on this year's list included Hong Kong film star Aaron Kwok and China-born Joan Chen, who burst on to the movie scene in Bernardo Bertolucci's "The Last Emperor" in 1987.

Chen returned to the limelight at this year's Golden Horses, picking up the best leading actress award for her role in "The Home Song Stories".