As for the thing about this board slowing down, it's not just HKMDB, it's just the net in gerenal. I remember when I first got started there were literally a handful of sites and the alt-asian-movies newsgroup, now there are tens of thousands of sites out there... things have just become diluted.
While I can't comment on the dilution of Asian cinema websites, per se, as I regularly visit only about six sites (including HKfilm) related to Asian cinema that I find dependable, reliable and reasonably updated (I contribute to just only two), I must say I find most if not all of the sites related to Hong Kong cinema in particular, rather lacking, surprisingly.
While I can find reviews of, say ELECTION, or ROB-B-HOOD or most new releases from Hong Kong, as well as the endless re-releases of high-profile "classics" at sites like HKFilm, BRNS, Illuminated Lantern, KFC, LoveHKFilm, CityOnFire and many more, what I often
can't find, is information on the countless Hong Kong movies that have fallen off the radar. You'll find a laundry list of these in the "2007 Digital Scrounge" thread. I've picked up a lot of them over the past couple of months at bargain prices, and it kinda saddens me that so little information exists about them, outside of (often incomplete) cast & credit lists here. Even in my first couple of posts there, in which I begged for opinions on anything I found, most people simply hadn't seen them.
Which shows me that the dissemination of Hong Kong cinema to the masses via the internet is nowhere near as all-encompassing as it could be. Of course, from an entirely selfish perspective, that's not entirely a bad thing, since it allows me a sense of discovery with many of these titles which recalls the feeling I had when I first got hooked on this stuff!
And I'm not talking about the no-budget DV stuff, either. If you look through that thread, you can find any number of titles from solid directors with name actors that have, at best, one or two OLD reviews in the database. Many have none, neither here nor at many other sites.
It's almost as though a lot of fans and webmasters have simply gone through the list of three or four hundred "Hong Kong movies you must see"—basically, the titles raved about in fanzines of old and books like Sex & Zen & A Bullet In The Head, Hong Kong Action Cinema, etc.— and then have stuck to almost nothing but new releases and reissues of key titles ever since.
There's a lot of stuff floating around out there that just isn't feeling the love. I know I may have a bit of an advantage in finding some of these old treasures with my recent relocation, but the truth is, I used to drive three hours to load up on this stuff, and would often take a chance on cheapo DVD sales at places like Poker and DDD just to see what so many other people seemed to be missing.
Don't get me wrong, I'm in no way criticizing the content or quality of these sites. They've all been very helpful in cross-checking information and such, and the forums are often fun to read. In fact, my hope is that people like Mr. Blue will keep plugging away at their sites, because there's SO MANY titles out there that haven't been given their due. One might have to dig through boxes of old VCDs, or even (gasp!) laserdiscs to find them, but they're there. If you don't live in a big city, you might have to travel a bit to find them, but they're there. And they're often cheap, which helps keep the burnout at bay, I find.
The best I can do for the moment is buy them and upload screengrabs of credits so Bob's DB can be even better in the future. Thankfully, others have the same idea (hell, Mr. Bearserk even finds a lot of the same movies!!
) and have been helping out in this regard.