Singapore censorship begun in 1910 as a Theatres Enactment that had all films screened approved by local authorities. In 1923 this evolved into the first censorship office of Malaya, which practiced strict censorship till World War 2. The Cinema Ordinance Act was laid down in 1953 and the Board of Film Censors (BFC), which would subsequently be known as the Ministry of Information, Communication and the Arts (MICA), was formed. The gaining of self governance in 1959 was a turn towards even tighter censorship with the 1953 act changed into the Cinematograph Films Act. All through the 1960s a large number of films were banned; 60 fell to censorship in 1960 alone compared to the 10 just a year before that and only in the 1970s did censorship begin to loosen. (Uhde & Ng, 2010, pp. 174 – 179).

In realizing the need for a system of rating films and media, a film classification system was born in 1991 along with the formation of the Censorship Review Committee (CRC); a body which would convene every decade to review and keep the country’s classification and censorship system up to date with the changes in society. The initial rating system with General (G), Parental Guidance (PG), and Restricted 18 (R), slowly evolved into the multi-rating system we know today. Most recently, 2009 and 2010 mark important times for Singapore’s censorship. Due to the rapid changes of the media and social world, the CRC has formed at a mid-term point to access the need for change in the area; the results of which will only be known mid this year. (Siew, 2009).
The role of censorship has always been about preventing media that could “put ideas into the heads…” of the people. (Uhde & NG. 2010. P. 175). Simply put, censorship has always been about thought control. In the 1960s, when the country was experiencing “political changes, social turbulence and general uncertainty with the Malaysian Federation, separation from the Federation, and communal riots”, the justification for having stringent censorship so as to not allow “unwanted” and “undesirable” influences that distract from the goal of industralisation and nation building could arguably be valid and necessary. (Uhde & NG. 2010. p. 176).

Today however, with Singapore being one of the more developed countries in Asia, more focus has been placed in arts, media and culture. Yet despite having taken a significant turn towards a more “liberal” stance in terms of censorship by adopting classification, films in Singapore still seem to have trouble getting past the censors when it comes to certain themes or issues. This is especially true for local films because of the suggested double standard, which will be discussed later in the paper, that local censorship authorities practice.

In general, films that fall within the classification system tend to have little trouble in this regard, it is when films end up beyond the R21 mark and fall within the “out-of-bounds” area that the issues arise. When this happens, films are either asked to make cuts in order to fit in to one of the existing categories or are outright banned altogether. The result of this is that some are led to think that this change that MDA has made in moving to classification is merely cosmetic while the conservative mindset inherent within the body still remains unchanged.

According to Tan (2007), in reference to the latest released 2003 report from the CRC, censorship is necessary today in order to maintain social order, to safeguard moral values of society, to protect multiracialism and to protect the vulnerable like the young. Apparently, censorship is given this role because the large majority of Singaporeans are still too conservative to accept such content and this “majority” looks to the government to regulate and control the flow of such content within the society. The problem with this justification is that the constitution of material that is deemed unsuitable seems arbitrarily decided based on the authorities’ benchmark on suitability contrary to what they claim.

Ironically, the recommendations made by the Censorship Review Committee of 2002 provided some interesting results regarding censorship. The report shows through surveys done, that 53 percent of participants wanted less censorship. Half of the participants also felt that homosexual related content was fine as long as it was not exploitative in nature and apart from the religious bodies, most people felt that such content could be shown in public under an adequate rating; echoing the opinion voiced by certain groups that homosexual themed films should see the light of day in the commercial world. (Au, 2003).

However, despite such results, homosexual related content remains largely excluded from the film industry in Singapore with numerous such films like “Solos” and “Blind Pig Who Wants to Fly”, banned entirely. In relation to such content, MDA has apparently placed the terms exploitative and promoting homosexuality under such large all encompassing umbrellas that render almost any homosexual content as such. As stated by Au (2009), it seems like any content that depicts homosexuals as normal human beings who experience happiness is deemed as a promotion of homosexuality.

An example given by Au (2009), deals with the issue of a film “Devotee” in which there was a scene that MDA had claimed to be explicit in nature. In fact, the scene merely consisted of implied sexual intercourse through depiction of the position of two male bodies and involved absolutely no frontal nudity; a method which is commonly seen in many heterosexual movies.

In considering the facts, one cannot help but question if the censorship authorities are truly acting out the will of the majority or is it that these supposed “heartlanders” are merely an idealistic entity and clever political move to make people think the way they want them to think, resulting in people following and accepting such ideals in fear of being “different” than the rest of the community?

A closer look into the other reasons given for the necessity of censorship renders them to seem unsound as well. In terms of social order, although to a lesser degree, the censorship body finds issue with what they deem to be overtly violent films in fear that they may instill violent behavior amongst the people. The debate in regards to the effects of violence in media has been ever ongoing but according to Hill (1997), a study that was carried out showed that most people who watch violent films can fully distinguish between real violence and fictional violence. In fact, people who enjoy watching violent movies all tend to abhor actual violence.

Contrary to MDAs reasoning, violence in films tends to instill stronger emotions from audiences because they grow to care and feel for the character. Instead, it is violence that is viewed in news reports that desensitizes the viewer because of their “out of context” nature. To simply say that the films depicting violence influence the individual beyond mere thought and motivates acts that threaten social order is as Tan (2009), puts it, an exaggeration motivated by paranoia. (p. 82)

“Party political films”; that is, “films that are made by any person and directed towards any political end in Singapore”, have long been banned without hesitation as well. (Uhde & Ng, 2010. p. 181). Numerous films such as “Vision of Persistence” (2002), “Singapore Rebel” (2005) and “Zahari’s 17 Years” (2006), all of which revolve around members of political opposition in Singapore come under this umbrella. However, in 2005 a political documentary series by Channel News Asia managed to fall outside of what constitutes a party political film. The interesting thing to note here is that what is different in this case, is that the show was about Singapore’s ruling People’s Action Party and its ministers instead of any other opposition members. The show was called to be a depiction of current affairs and was hence permitted. This contradictory episode further backs up the claim of the subjectivity and ambiguous nature of the arbitrary decision making of authorities when it comes to what falls into what category of censorship.

It is a known fact that films like the animated film “Princess”, which deal with racial or religious issues are as likely to fall from the ban hammer in Singapore as those that contain content mentioned above. In claiming to protect multiracialism, Singapore has always done so by avoiding the subject altogether instead of actively engaging it and developing understanding between the races. The method of maintaining multiracial harmony is reflected here in the way race and religion related content films are censored. What this effectively does is that instead of protecting multiracial harmony, authorities have deprived the chance for people to address existing issues in Singapore’s society that have long been swept under the carpet. It disallows them to engage in critical thinking therefore making the so called democratic society a “dead society” as expressed by Tan (2009) in reference to “The Satanic Verses” by Salman Rushdie, which has also been banned in Singapore.

Swedish film “An Extraordinary Study of Human Degradation” was made to cut its sex scene by the MDA before allowing its screening in the 22nd Singapore International Film Festival (SIFF). Excessive sexual content goes against what authorities claim to be moral values of society and have to be censored. As Tan (2009) explains, an individual’s moral standards are highly ambiguous and can hardly be ascertained as a definite truth more so with the moral standards of an entire society. Whose standards then are we talking about? The subjectivity of the censorship body here is unquestionable. But the most contradicting part is that these moral values, were instilled in the people by things like thought control through censorship, and to now have censorship authorities claim that censorship is necessary to protect the very same moral values is certainly an irony.

The protection of the young might be the only reasoning that holds up against scrutiny. The young are extremely impressionable and easily influenced by whatever they come into contact with. Hence, it is necessary to watch over them to ensure that material unsuitable for their age group is either held back from them, or viewed under the appropriate guidance. The problem however is that this is a role that does not belong to the censorship authorities. In one of the surveys conducted by the 2002 CRC, the results reflected that 71 percent of participants felt that parents were the ones responsible for what children are exposed to. Add to that is the fact that the classification and ratings system exist for this very reason. Once again, the facts show that despite all their reasoning for the necessity of the current censorship system, when placed under scrutiny what it points to is a draconian and arbitrary act of thought control and political safeguards in regards to content that challenges the conservative mindset of the authorities rather than what is claimed. As Davies (2004) puts it, “Censorship is a basic form of thought control, thought control is a basic form of dictatorial government.” (as cited in Tan, 2009, p. 83)

So it seems the authorities practice somewhat draconian methods of censorship while claiming to act in line with the will of the people. But how is that a hindrance to local filmmakers? Strict censorship laws are nothing new in Asia. However in countries such as Hong Kong and Korea; two of the more prominent Asian film industries, it has been shown that the relaxation in censorship laws factor in as a major reason for the success of their respective industries.

In the case of Hong Kong cinema, its general freedom from governmental censorship has for a long time allowed it the breathing room to create wonderful films that contain depiction of violence, sex and that involved controversial topics like homosexuality, religion and even politics. It is without a doubt one of the reasons why Hong Kong’s film industry was able to flourish. But more significant to Singapore’s situation, is the case of the film industry of South Korea. From Japanese invasion to Communism to Militarism, South Korea has always had to deal with political interference in regards to the arts, which of course included films. Held back by censorship the country used to produce films that ranged from propaganda material to films that failed to capture the hearts and attention of the Korean public. It was only during the 1990s that saw a drastic change in the way films were allowed to tell stories. The breaking free from military rule and into democracy saw the lifting of censorship which gave unprecedented freedom to filmmakers to weave their films around culture, modernization, the nation and even politics. Robinson (2005) states that this was what effectively led to the now commonly known Korean Wave. This freedom is also what brought Korean cinema to new heights with movies such as “Shiri” (1999) and “Joint Security Area” (2000), both of which had characters revolving around the political division of North and South Korea and both of which were huge successes in the Korean box office. (pp 25 – 29)

By using Korea’s evolution in the film industry with the liberalization of censorship as an example, the possibilities of the direction that the local film industry can go upon a similar lifting of censorship is clear. Yet despite Singapore proclaiming to be a democratic society and despite the so called “liberalization” of its censorship system, the control in content by the authorities remain dogmatic and strict due largely to what director to “Outsiders” 2004, Sam Loh calls a “Double Stardard” practiced by censorship authorities. In an interview with him, Sam Loh who withdrew his film from the 2004 SIFF due to MDA insisting that cuts had to be made, laments how the MDA would be doubly strict when dealing with local made films. When given some thought it is not difficult to see where that there is truth in the statement. Films such as “Da Vinci Code” and “Brokeback Mountain” which deal with religious and homosexual themes respectively would not be able to pass the censors if local counterparts were made. This added strictness to the already conservative boundaries of the censorship system leads to one undesirable effect in local filmmakers – Self Censorship. Because filmmakers here are consciously aware that numerous kinds of content may render their film unsuitable as deemed by the censors, most of them practice self censorship before the film is even made. By ruling out what they think cannot be done they effectively remove possibilities to potential stories, and that is ultimately a factor that kills off what may otherwise be potentially good films. Tripathi (2002) aptly expresses, “Singapore’s leadership bemoans the lack of creativity among its people, and exhorts them to dare to be different. But when some do, the establishment comes down upon them, because it fears spontaneity.”

In conclusion, the censorship in Singapore has certainly come a long way to reach where it is today but despite the claims of moving from cutting to classifying, the basic mindset of MDA in dealing with censorship remains very much subjective and arbitrary; seemingly still based on politics and thought control. The only difference is having the responsibility of cutting shifted to the distributors or filmmakers themselves. In placing the justifications for such censorship under scrutiny, the reasons for its necessity fall apart and make it seem to truly be a hindrance that limits local filmmakers. With Korean and Hong Kong Cinema as prime examples of the possibilities, in order for any hope of having the local film industry go anywhere from here, censorship authorities need to stop thinking of Singaporeans as immature, ignorant, narrow minded and intolerant and implement changes that go beyond a mere facelift in the censorship system that reflects the democratic society that Singapore claims to be. Though certainly not the sole factor that determines the success of local cinema, a lifting of dogmatic censorship and the moving towards a more refined classification system to let viewers actively choose what to view will certainly prove to be a great step forward in the right direction. After all, censorship should be a matter of choice not to mention the impracticality of it all in today’s internet age. With the government openly stating they wish to head towards more freedom in censorship and with the CRC currently holding a review as this paper is being written, there is at least some hope that things may turn for the better…

Written by Tan Quancai Eugene

References
Books
Hill A. (1997). Shocking Entertainment: Viewer Response to Violent Movies. United Kingdom: John Libbey Media.

Robinson M. (2005). Contemporary Cultural Production in South Korea: Vanishing Meta-Narratives of Nation. Chi-Yun S. & Stringer J. (Eds). New Korean Cinema (pp. 15 – 31). Great Britain: Edinburgh University Press.

Tan K.P. (2007). Censorship in Whose Name? Tan K.P. (Ed). Renaissance Singapore? (pp. 71 – 94). Singapore: NUS Press

Uhde J. & Ng Y.U. (2010). Latent Images: Film in Singapore. Singapore: NUS Press.

Web
Au W.P. (November 2009). Censorship Review – A Bit More Loosening for the Wrong Reasons. Retrevied 31th Januray 2010 from Yawning Bread: http://www.yawningbread.org/arch_2003/yax-343.htm

Au W.P. (August 2009). Film Censors Behaving Like Bullies. Retreived 30th January 2010 from Yawning Bread: http://www.yawningbread.org/index2.htm

Au W.P. (September 2009). Film Correspondance Part 1. Retrevied 30th Januray 2010 from Yawning Bread: http://www.yawningbread.org/index2.htm

Au W.P. (November 2009). Film Correspondance Part 2. Retrevied 30th Januray 2010 from Yawning Bread: http://www.yawningbread.org/index2.htm

Board of Film Censors. (2010). Retrieved 30th January 2010 from MDA website: http://www.mda.gov.sg/Industry/Films/Classification/Pages/BoardofFilmClassification.aspx
Censorship in Singapore. (2010). Retrieved 30th January 2010 from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_Singapore

Classification Ratings for Films and Videos. (2010). Retrieved 30th January 2010 from MDA website: http://www.mda.gov.sg/Industry/Films/Classification/Pages/ClassificationRatings.aspx

OB Marker. (2010). Retreived 31st January 2010 from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OB_marker

Philips R. (April 2000). Film Festival Director About Censorship in Singapore. Retrieved 31st January 2010 from Singapore Window: http://www.singapore-window.org/sw02/021214af.htm

Pravda (2007 April 23). No homosexual movie to be shown at Singapore film festival. Posted to: http://singabloodypore.rsfblog.org/archive/2007/04/23/no-homosexual-movie-to-be-shown-at-singapore-film-festival.html

Ratnala T.N. (November 1997). Film Classification for Restricted, [Restricted] (Artistic) Category Retrieved 31st January 2010 from Singapore Infopedia: http://infopedia.nl.sg/articles/SIP_15_2004-12-27.html

Siew S. (September 2009). Censorship Review Committee. Retrieved 31st January 2010 from Singapore Infopedia: http://infopedia.nl.sg/articles/SIP_1571_2009-09-18.html

Tripathi S. (December 2002). Artistic Ambitions Don’t Play Well in Uptight Singapore: http://www.singapore-window.org/sw02/021214af.htm

Wee S. L. (April 2007). Singapore Censors two films under Sex, Religion. Retrieved 31st January 2010: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSSIN22266420070420
Wisekwai (2009 April 10). Singapore Fest Drops Six Titles Over Censorship. Posted to: http://thaifilmjournal.blogspot.com/2009/04/singapore-fest-drops-six-titles-over.html

To avoid spoilers, a short synopsis. Ekin Cheng plays Inspector Wong, head of the Miscellaneous Affairs Department which handles supernatural cases. He trains the newcomer to the Department, Sergeant Lee, played by Shawn Yue, by constantly reminding him with his mantra- the titular Rule #1: there are no ghosts- only to have it be contradicted later on in the movie.
The story is a ghost story, but what makes it unique is that is fresh and original. Given a Singaporean twist by it’s Singaporean director, the film changed some of the rules of horror films by even adding a plot twist at the end, which brought the whole film around, completing the circle.The actors were superb. Both Ekin Cheng and Shawn Yue played their roles with great emotion and ability. One could really feel the actors being absorbed into their characters.

The movie really plays well with the conventions of horror movies, using jarring sounds and darkness to bring to life (ironically) the ghosts depicted in the movie. The sounds, ambience and music definitely added to the eeriness of the movie, as there would be a sudden high pitched sound or a loud bang when a ghost appeared, or the music would suddenly dip in volume and tempo when something bad was about to happen. It used its sounds very effectively, since they scared a large portion of the audience in the preview theatre and I when the movie was screening.

The movie also plays very well with lighting, such as showing dimly lit corridors and tastefully illuminated sense where supernatural occurrences were happening. The aesthetic effect of the lighting was really felt throughout the audience and really made me feel scared, but so impressed at how brilliantly the lights complimented the music and the sounds.
I would strongly recommend this movie to all my friends and to horror movie fans, even if you are not a horror movie fan (Like me. I simply watched it because it’s a local film) you should still watch it, and be surprised and awed (like I was). I give this movie 4 and a half stars out of five.

Reviewed by Simon Lew

Question: Hi I’m Farhan from 3rd year FSV, what are the toughest challenges you faced directing in a language that you weren’t entirely fluent in?

Eric Khoo(director):To be honest it is pretty easy because the great thing was that Francis is fluent in English so he knew exactly  what the character was all about and you know he was more of a friend for me than a guy who discussed about the character. (Writer’s name) wrote the dialogue and he has translate the dialogue into Tamil and it was done with one of the actresses in the film Grace so he says okay, I don’t want to translate it this way let’s go for this other way so I know exactly what they’re basically saying and on location with Grace  I would have the headphones on her ears so that she would listen to the way both Francis and (the kid) would pronounce the words and I said if ever there’s any sort of fault in it, just say cut because I wouldn’t know but I watch it for the performance and how they would act it out so you know I was saying, by the grace of god I found grace and she became my ears and she…

Kim Hoh Wong (writer) :And it was actually quite challenging. In a way, you know, it was just that we were very lucky to have Grace who happened to be an actress. I mean she was very experienced, she had done theatre she had done TV, she was very sensitive to, lets say, the nuances of both English and Tamil, she understood exactly what I meant when I said “ you know, okay this has got to sound like this, it can’t sound too stilted, too formal” she’s a trained actress and a trained director, she knows exactly what we were trying to achieve and then sometimes she gives rather good suggestions, I think Eric gave her cart blanch in the sense that okay grace listen you know I mean we are just the two of us are just looking out for the expressions and how they are acting (interruption)

Eric Khoo :For me I was more concerned in the terms of the level which Francis was drunk, because you know massive drunk, not so drunk,  you know and it had to be realistic and Francis actually did a great job and he was not drinking whisky at all, it was just Chinese tea, I mean how drunk you want this that was important.

Kim Hoh Wong (writer) :The thing is we didn’t know that Tamil is quite a tonal language  so it like you could be mispronouncing words  despite what Francis told us he’s not exactly 100% fluent in the language so often time he is pronouncing it wrong  if we didn’t have her around we would be in deep trouble

Question: You were saying that sometimes that you have only 4 hours to scout place on the spot what are the challenges you faced in getting location for such a short notice?

Eric Khoo : We didn’t film in the MRT though…(audience laugh)

Tan Fong Cheng (producer):And knowing that we had a very low budget  for this show I think we were very realistic about lots of things so when Eric says I just need to film this boy talking so the first thing I was thinking was a public place so spaces like parks open space where you don’t have to ask for permission that would be the fastest and I found out that it would be good to be familiar actually those places where you live in there are lots of those spots just take notice of them because you never know in last minutes it will be very useful for do location like…

Eric Khoo : And find them in close proximity so that you don’t trouble the…

Tan Fong Cheng (producer):So it’s places where you’re familiar with like the place where I was looking for at 4 hours time that was like at the back of my house and it was just next to the railway track and I think ,personally, it had flavor …and that is the advice when I became a production assistant …this director told me that “what you should do is always have a notebook that as you move around Singapore or any place just take note that it could be locations that you could use on a shoot so that during times of need you could always refer to this little notebook because it will be a very good reference to you and I think it is something that I have learn.

Eric Khoo : But actually when I see a location, I went around at night to find a little cheap bar and because we didn’t have a budget so we went to Joo Chiat and Little India and finally when one of the student from Lassalle says “I think I found a place for you” and it was this transsexual bar at Orchard towers or was it call ‘Crazy Horse’ and they have all these graffiti on the wall… and it was brilliant.  And then I met the owner. The owner looks like an old auntie in her 60s and I said I love this place and ask can I film here and she said as long as you don’t depict this place as…and she was so nice and she let us film there for two days and leave by 5 and we gave her an angpao.

Question: Having won the cultural medallion, how do you see your future role in the film industry?

Eric Khoo: I won the Young Artist Award 10 years ago…I thought I was very old and you know, I’m always like looking out for signs and signals so when I thought that because of the 80 thousand dollar price, I told Francis we cannot make the film and in some ways if I hadn’t receive the Cultural Medallion, I may have made the film last year…and I don’t think I am going to change meaning I’ll still make films but I think it was a good point that I got it last year. Does that answer your question?

Question: I heard you have been traveling around…

Eric Khoo: Yeah…I just came back last week from Paris because I was doing the promotion for My Magic. It’ll be released there November 5th, the day we’ll know whether Obama gets in (laugh). And the film was also premiered in Busan and it is great because it has really strong distributor called Eureka. They’ve got the new film called “The Wrestler” with Mickey Rourke and they will try to release My Magic in February or March. Now Francis is in the Tokyo Film Festival where they’re screening it but I think in terms of territories, the one territory that I really want has always been Japan and I hope we can make a deal with them and if the distributor can believe in the film and will do some marketing, I think we can hit the box office. In Busan, it was all packed halls about 600 seats and the audience cried, they were moved by the film.

Question: Because you like to have Kim Hoh as your writer, how is your relationship with him?

Eric Khoo : Well we’re actually lovers….(audience laugh). Well, I know Kim Hoh for around twenty years or 25 years? And we would always joked about us doing a script together and I think he was working at THE NEW PAPER and he was bored there so I said to him since you are so bored, maybe its time for you to write and…okay I’ll give you an idea of BE WITH ME its quite interesting. A couple years back, my nephew who was half French, 13 years old, came to Singapore during Christmas for a visit and he was talking to me about this girl that he was so in love in and he had seen this movie together and when his arm has crossed the gates of her arm, he felt like sea wave just move through his body. And he was like “I’ve been here for 2 weeks and I just can’t get her out of my mind and then I start to think back…who was my first love? Who I was crazy about?

Well, I’m going to make something up. It’s like teenage hood, middle aged and old aged and when I was hanging up with Kim Hoh in a bar in Holland Village and I said lets do a film that would end with HOPE but I want it to be almost a silent film and I would like it to be in the form of which people communicate whether its SMS or e-mail or a letter of communication and we were working on this and our main central character was a journalist. And, in one of the earlier draft, Francis from MY MAGIC, was going to be a character in Be With Me. But, characters came and characters went but actually it was teenage, middle aged guy and old age. And then Kim Hoh was pulled to The Straits Time so he left The New Paper and I remember all these discussion because we meet a lot of interesting people.

Transcript from Muhamad Afiq B Jaafar

Special Thanks: CTV of Ngee Ann Polytechic

Both Neo-realism and Singapore films possess similar qualities that clearly show the former’s influence on the latter. One such similarity lies in the tendency to portray films that reflect contemporary issues in relation to the society and the country. In the case of Italian Neo-realism, a film like “The Bicycle Thief” reflects the social status of Italy during the post World War II period that it is based on. In the film, the society of the time is portrayed to be plagued with poverty; one whereby jobs are scarce and where people fight hard in order to earn enough to put food on the table and a roof over their heads. This quality is similarly present in most of the films on the Singapore front. In the film “I Not Stupid”, the filmmakers depict the highly stressful situation that local students have been placed in as they struggle through in keeping up with the standards of the education system of the country. It portrays social issues in regards to the forming of ‘classes’ and ‘ranks’ between students and their parents in relation to the grade categories the students have been placed in by the ‘streaming’ system in primary education.

Another quality that links the two camps is the way in which filmmakers of both sides deeply ground their films in reality. The films are usually set in realistic situations and portray characters that champion the everyday life of urban, working class folk instead of placing focus on the upper class citizens or on fantastical settings and characters. Once again for Italian Neo-realism, “The Bicycle Thief” acts as an exemplar for such a quality in its portrayal of the events involving a factory worker in his search for his stolen bicycle and the difficulties and failures he goes through in doing so. Likewise for Singapore cinema, a movie like “Money No Enough” bears just as much of such a trait in its portrayal of working class characters concerning themselves with monetary issues and how they are affected by governmental policies regarding money matters. Yet, despite the strong presence of such a characteristic in most Singapore films, it should be noted that this similarity with Neo-realism films is not always present. With visual effects and Computer Graphics (CG) becoming more and more accessible to filmmakers all around the world, Singapore made films such as the recent “881” and “Ah Long Pte Ltd” have begun to include depictions of somewhat fantastical situations that take away from realism rather than further enhancing it; evident in instances where characters seem to possess somewhat superhuman abilities and powers.

The third and last similarity we are going to take a look at is present in the dual faceted nature of films from both camps. One facet presents a reportage view of whatever social conditions that are present at the given time period of the film, while the other concerns the morality or moral struggles in people as portrayed in characters. In “Bicycle thief”, the Neo-realism filmmaker ‘reports’ in a way on the political and social situation of poverty in the society in its realistic portrayals. By doing so, the film indirectly calls out for reforms and changes to be made. As for the moral facet, it surfaces when the main character of the film finally breaks down and succumbs to temptation when he himself tries to steal a bicycle out of utter desperation. Similarly, in terms of Singapore cinema, “Ah Long Pte Ltd” ‘reported’ somewhat on the practices of loan sharks that are considerably prominent in certain parts of Asia and the harm they cause to the public. Its portrayals, though accompanied by sometimes exaggerated and slapstick situations, call out for the ceasing of such cruel and harmful practices. The moral issue is this case, arises when a young teenage girl whose parents are killed as a result of such practices, lashes out to claim vengeance upon those responsible by use of similarly violent and cruel methods. It questions the morality of the seeking of vengeance and the use of violence against violence, cruelty against cruelty.

Yet as prominent as are the similarities between Neo-realism and Singapore films, so are the differences between them. One of the most apparent of these differences stands out in the use of actors for films of both camps. In Italian Neo-realism films, mostly non-actors or a mix of both professional as well as non-actors are picked to fill roles in the films. This means that people are mostly picked to fill roles based on their suitability to a particular role rather than their experiences as actors or their ability to act. “The Bicycle Thief” for example, has its main character, a factory worker, played by a man who was in fact an actual factory worker before joining the film as a cast member. This is something that greatly differs in Singapore made films. In fact, it is one area that Singapore films actually more closely resemble Hollywood or Hong Kong productions. Singapore cinema makes use of mostly professional actors that largely consist of recognizable names from television or stage. The practice can be seen in a film such as “Just Follow Law” in which household names like Gurmit Singh and Fann Wong are cast at the main characters.

The differences of course, do not stop there. One of the other differences present is in the narrative structure adopted by films of either side. Neo-realist films had during its time, sought to break the standard narrative structure of films from other regions and films that came before Neo-realism; films that focused heavily on narrative continuity. Neo-realism brought out content that was more episodic in nature and contained loose cause and effect connections. It meant that events could simply just take place without proper justification for its occurrence and that at times, what would be considered as a ‘cause’ in a cause and effect chain would yield no ‘effect’. In such instances, even mood and emotion could sometimes change drastically without clear motivation or justification if any at all. One good example to show this quality is in the film “Rome, Open City”. In this exemplary Neo-realist film, the death of a character is shown to happen with no reason or rhyme whatsoever and the effect of her demise is never portrayed or addressed in the film. The death simply happens and is almost immediately ‘pushed aside’ as the film returns to show subsequent events completely unrelated to what is shown previously, never returning or ‘looking back’ to the event again all throughout the rest of the film. In addition to the episodic nature and loose cause and effect of these films is the lack of closure in their narration. This is something that can be evidently seen in “The Bicycle Thief” in its use of an open-ended finale with the father and son walking on towards an unknown fate. On the other side of the fence, Singapore films rather contrastingly, adopt mostly a mix of both standard narrative and episodic structures. In numerous cases, events are not only shown to have proper cause and effect chains, but also contain proper build-up towards emotional scenes followed by an eventual release of emotions and the allowance for what is shown to set in. As can be seen in the film “881”, the events portrayed in the film follow the characters in a narrative that tells of a group of ‘Ge Tai’ singers in their pursuit to emerge tops in the year’s performance while at the same time interweaving it with episodic content that depict characters in situations that may or may not relate to their preparation to the final performance day. In stark contrast to the example in “Rome, Open City”, the interactions between characters here move on to setup the final outcome of the film concerning the death of a major character. In this case, the effects of the death are instead given sufficient screen time to draw out, working in hand with the victory of the protagonists to offer proper closure to the film.

The final difference we will look at concerns the use of sound in Neo-realist and Singapore films. Italian Neo-realism deals with sound entirely in post production. Once again drawing upon the example of “Rome, Open City”, the film had all of its footage filmed entirely in silence. Sound was only later added onto the recorded footage in post production to produce its final product. Films of Singapore cinema however, tend to make use of both sound that is recorded on location as well as that which is done in post production. This is evident in practically all of Singapore made films in their use of on location dialogue with sound effects being a mix of on location and post created and music that is done in post production. Not all of the various similarities and differences between Italian Neo-realism and Singapore cinema have been discussed, yet the comparison of some of the more prominent similarities shows truth in the opinion that Singapore cinema does indeed draw influence from Neo-realist films. The evident differences between the two camps however also point out that the films made in Singapore do not mirror Neo-realism is its entirety, bearing not only possible influences from other film movements and trends as well as some qualities perhaps unique to Singapore cinema.

Written by Eugene Tan

Three people all connected in some way by this seat, all having their own problems and conflicts along the way. This three pronged narrative cycle ticks forward during the course of the movie and we see these three characters in a few ways.

One thing that stood out for me and that I was impressed with was its impeccable lighting and cinematography . The long drawn out shadows of the cinema created an ambiance to set the stage for the narrative as well as the interiors of all the characters respective homes. The cinema itself emitted an almost labyrinth like appeal due to this – spinning rays of light across the screen and really creating something more than just a location.

For our sexually-charged frustrated middle aged woman we are greeted with a slightly over saturated scene – with over exposed whites; glaring and bright. In the case of the old man we see him through a veil of pale colours – desaturated in many ways perhaps emphasizing the solitude he feels. For the young Indian girl close-ups and overpowering ambiance sound is present – perhaps to distract and distort and to give us an inkling into the problem this troubled youth is facing. I felt it added to the whole feel of the film which was in essence to represent these characters in many different ways.

The scene that I found most memorable though was our old man chasing a lonely cockroach around his flat. It was memorable, funny and in a way sad as well – bringing a range of emotions that was interesting for just one scene devoid of dialogue.

What I found equally interesting was the fact I could relate to the character of our troubled Indian Girl. Was this the aim for Anthony? To give a range of characters and problems so that we might , in turn, relate these problems in some way with our own lives? After all we all long for somethings we don’t usually get for find trouble in achieving. This stood out the most for me. G-23’s ability to relate to the audience in some way or another . I recently wrote in another forum about “What is Cinema?” In my opinion it is in this very powerful quality of relation. If I relate to one of the character on screen, I can see myself in their shoes and thus take something home with me once the film is over. How did they overcome their trials and tribulations? Did I really do that or was I really that unfair? Questions like these evolve from this relation after the movie is over and I felt that G-23’s ability to relate was its best and most defining feature.

Reviewed by Kane Wheatley-Holder

From human dramas, to heartwarming tales to inspirational and character driven stories, the night indeed brought to audiences a wide array of short films to enjoy and appreciate. Paper Stars, The Investigators and The Road That Follows, explored the depths of the human psyche. While Paper Stars and The Investigators dealt with the contrast between the physical world and the inner struggles of its characters, The Road That Follows portrayed psychological struggles of three entirely different people in society. Though mostly of a grim nature, Paper Stars and The Road That Follows added life in each scene with interesting use of a variety of locales and of color.As mentioned, the night was not just about inner struggles; it was also about tugging on the heartstrings of the event’s audiences and bringing smiles to faces with heartwarming stories. Uncle Downstairs and Sakkarangal took on this mantle and brought to viewers stories of friendship between unlikely characters. Uncle Downstairs did so while including the use of dialogue that was both charming and entertaining, quite so because it is firmly rooted in real life situations between similar personalities in the real world. Sakkarangal on the other hand, focused on wonderfully piecing together scenes that successfully showed the relationship between its characters in a touching, amusing, and most importantly, believable way.

The relationship between characters never comes off as being forced or rushed and who could forget the moments such as those of old lady chasing off the young boy or when the young boy rides happily off with his “reclaimed” bicycle only to realise that he had mistakenly betrayed his new found friend and his offering of his favourite toy to her as an apology. It is interesting to note also, that this was all pulled off with little use of dialogue between the two characters. The filmmakers explained that they continually bore in mind from start to finish, the fact that this was the telling of a very simple story and that they tried to keep everything simple and indeed, the charm of the story lies in its simplicity in telling a simple story.
The other three films that were also shown were Mrs. Postman, Childhood Games and Meng Xiang, all of which were stories that revolved around a single character. Yet, they could not be more different from each other. From the get go, the filmmakers of Mrs. Postman establish the character as one that is bubbling with life, warmth and kindness to the people around her with the use of a charmingly edited opening. The film than takes audiences through her fall from grace and eventual repenting. Here, the filmmakers succeed in creating a character that is easily likeable and one that audiences are able to sympathise with despite her flaws. The ending further adds to this by revealing the character’s motivations for her actions. Childhood Games stands right on the other end of the spectrum in relation to its main character. While Mrs. Postman portrayed a very cheerful and upbeat character, Childhood Games revolves around what is likely to be one of the darkest characters of the night.

The film deals with the character’s battle with his inner demons as he struggles to come to terms with himself for his past failings. The fact that this character is played by known heartthrob David Aw, makes the character even darker as it shows that physical appearances can be deceiving and that even the prettiest of faces can have dark and horrible secrets. Though the portrayal of the deed is somewhat open ended, viewers should have no issue understanding or figuring out the heinous doings of the character in his youth due to the way the scene is cleverly written and shot. The fact that it only needs to be implied and not shown fully further proves the effectiveness of the scene. The last but definitely in no way the least is Meng Xiang. A film that undoubtedly took top spot of the night as it stands on a class of its own. Meng Xiang, tells the story of a young swimmer who struggles with his passion and dream, hence the title. Despite making use of a rather tried theme and subject, Meng Xiang triumphs in being a film that is well made throughout. From the breathtaking opening shot to the overall look, feel and pace of the film to the believable acting and writing, Meng Xiang does not at any point feel wrong or out of place. In fact, most of, if not the whole of the film does not even feel like a student film. Viewers would likely be reminded in viewing the film, of films that have been made by local professionals such as Royston Tan. Like the protagonist of the film, it probably won’t be too long before the filmmakers have their dreams fulfilled.With such quality showings with this year’s event, it would certainly be interesting to see how future graduating films compare. Whether or not they will be able to go from strength to strength will be revealed in time to come.

Reviewed by Eugene Tan

Keluar Baris (2007) – Boo Junfeng

In the time span of two days, Keluar Baris is about 18 years old boy’s contemplation toward National Service (NS), especially since he just returned home from Spain for a holiday. His father does not understand his son’s detest toward NS and failed to prepare him mentally for NS. The boy’s grandmother provides much of the comic relief, being naggy and muddleheaded. Keluar Baris reflects the attitudes of the many males in Singapore toward NS. Unlike some of Boo Junfeng’s work, Keluar Baris took on a realistic and unrefined look, using handheld camerawork and jump cuts. During a short interview, he mentioned that the dialogue between the boy and his friend in the National Stadium were improvised. Keluar Baris won for SIFF Best short film for SIFF.

Wet Seasons (2007) – Michael Tay

Lurid as the title sound, Wet seasons surprised the audience the true nature of film, though there were scenes of a sperm slithering about. Wet Seasons provides snippets of the relationship between Michael and someone unknown, represented by a skeleton. Michael narrates his yearn for this skeleton, despite of the ups and downs. The choice of shooting Wet Seasons as a stop animation adds a sense of quirkiness that I very much enjoyed. The revelation of who the skeleton is made it touching as you thinks back on Wet Seasons.

Love Me, Love My Dogs (2007) – Lincoln Chia Zhicheng

Love Me, Love My Dogs document a woman’s obsession over her dogs. Her life seemingly revolves around the dogs, if she shops, she would “shops for dog’s clothing’. Her love of dogs gets unhealthy when she highlighted that she loves her dogs more than her husband and son. Unlike many documentaries, Love Me, Love My Dogs is engaging for me as she is a very fascinating subject and arouses my curiosity toward her. Other than her obsession, she seems to be a man that underwent sex-change surgery as her feminine appearance contrasts her coarse and deep voice and she often refers ‘her’ husband as my man.

Para Asia (For Asia) (2007) –

Fran Borgia

Though Para Asia left the weakest impression for me, out of the entire series, it has a very powerful message to spread. It was shot in black and white and tells the story of a man bemoaned the lost of his loved one. Unsatisfied with just the memories of her in his mind, he wanted to keep memories of her as alive as possible. He goes to compile as strips of film with her in it and string it into a film. He brings it to a theater and projects it on the screen. She was moving within the images as though she was still alive. This exemplifies the power of film as it comforted the sorrowful soul of one man.

My Home, My Heaven (2006) – Muhammad EySham Ali

My Home, My Heaven explores the vicious cycle of delinquency within the Muslim community. Recently discharged from boy’s home, a young Malay teenager attempted to turns over a new leaf by working for his father, an elder in a mosque. His father contemplates to reconcile with him as he was too fixed on his narrow impression of his son. The young Malay found out that his younger brother was stealing bike parts. He realizes that his brother was going down to the same path as him. Toward the end, his brother was going to be caught in the act by his father. Doing what a good brother would do, he took the fall for his brother. This re-affirmed his father’s thoughts and he unquestionably punish him. His effort was for naught when his friend challenged him the idea that his brother would not be repent. My Home, My Heaven was proudly made by a group of Ngee Ann Polytechnic students from FSV for their final year project and it won them the SIFF Special Achievement Award.

Kallang Roar (2007) – Cheng Ding An

Kallang Roar re-tells the struggles of Uncle Choo, an unsung hero in Singapore football history. Mr. Ganesan, the chairman of the football association goes all the way to Johor to coax stubborn Uncle Choo to return and coach Singapore football national team. The film unfolds the reason Uncle Choo was hesitated to return and coach. Ding An effectively used only two locations throughout the film: A granite table in a garden and a locker room.  Kallang Roar would be my favorite film among the SIFF finalists’

film series. I enjoyed watching Mr. Ganesan and Uncle Choo bickering about the current game that was been played as though they were husband and wife. Uncle Choo brushed off Mr. Ganesan and dished out bits of wisdom, using kueh lapis as a metaphor. The style of the dialogue seems somewhat conventional and long-winded at times. It considerably did well enough as a short film that the director is planned to turn it into a feature film.

Silent Girls (2007) – Ric Aw

Drawing inspiration from the Infamous Tammy sex video, Ric Aw made a film that follows the journey of two teenagers girls in search of love. However, their gullible outlook of love fails them. The opening scene shows a girl to ask her friend how to make a love bite demonstrate just how gullible these girls are. The girl goes to arrange to meet and sleep with an older man, whom she chat online. On the other hand, her friend was video-tapped by her boyfriend of her stripping. She was reluctant initially but let down her guard when he muttered the three magical words to her: I love you. When they have sex together, the set designed to be pure in white and visually dreamy emphasizing her friend’s fantasized idea of sex. The video of her stripping inevitably leaks into the Internet. When she confronted him, only to forgives him immediately when he used the same trick she fallen for the last time. The film does offer hope when she questions what is love, proving that she did learned this incident. I found Silent Girls hard to shallows as such accounts does exist in Singapore, despite the title of Silent Girls implied such accounts are hush-hush in conservative Singapore.

Reviewed By Marilyn Wong

Photos are from http://www.filmfest.org.sg/singapore-shorts-finalists.php

His short film, 15, which won a Special Achievement Award at the 2002 Singapore International Film Festival, was made into his first feature film. 15 has brought him international acclaim for its graphic portrayal of local gangster life.

His second feature film, 4:30, was selected to be the closing film at the 2006 Singapore International Film Festival. 4:30 is a Japan-Singapore collaboration that was shot at an estimated budget of $400,000 on 35mm film with funding and support from NHK Japan, the Singapore Film Commission and Zhao Wei Films.

The film was released theatrically in Singapore to critical acclaim. 4:30 was also warmly received at the international film festival circuit. Besides being invited to screen at numerous festivals, the film won the Grand Prize for Best Film at the 8th International Film Festival Bratislava 2006, and the NETPAC award at the Hawaii International Film Festival 2006.

Gary Goh is a frequent collaborator on Royston’s works. His first project with Royston began in 2001, when he produced Royston’s short film 15.

In 2003, Gary was the production manager of 15: The Movie, the feature film which won the NETPAC-FIPRESCI award at the 2003 Singapore International Film Festival.

In 2006, he was the producer and assistant director of Royston Tan’s second feature film 4:30.

Over the years, Gary has also produced a number of Royston’s other short films.

He is currently a producer at Zhao Wei Films, helmed by the Singapore’s most renowned director Eric Khoo, producing television commercials, films and other media content.

***

Q: How much does the film 4:30 cost?

Gary: All in all about $400,000. And that is a very tight budget.

Q: And the money comes from?

Gary: It’s a three-way. We have Zhao Wei Films, Singapore Film Commission and NHK-Japan.

Royston: So what we did to contain the budget was to be very, very careful. A lot of rehearsals, our average ratio was 1:2. For the little boy, he’s very good, so it was 1:1. And that helped us save a lot of film because you can see that everything is done in one take. If one of them makes a mistake, we have to throw the whole can away and re-shoot. And the challenging part was where you saw the Korean man vomiting, mentally he was calculating like at 2 minutes and 24 seconds sharp, he has to puke so that we fully utilise the entire can of film. That scene alone took 5 hours.

Gary: And he had to puke eight times.

Royston: The timing and the puking wasn’t right.

Q: What did you base 4:30 on? Like a personal experience or a story you wanted to tell, or just another film that you make?

Royston: (laughs) I think for everything that I do, there’s a personal aspect of me. For all of us, as a kid we always look out for a superman or a superhero or somebody to look after us or even model after. And that’s… I think it derived from loneliness and also because I’ve seen this boy on television since he was a little kid and there was something about him and I wanted to tailor a film for him. So his input into the character helped me craft up a story.

Q: So a lot of yourself is in the film?

Royston: In fact there is a lot of how I feel but because it is through his eyes I feel he intensifies the whole experience even more. When he first read the script he said he knew how to do this role and he knew exactly how it feels.

Q: Can I ask about 15?

Royston: 15 I think was actually a new point for me because it’s not really my story but it was inspired by a group of ah-bengs I hang out with because I was teaching them drama. And that sort of changed a lot of things because they, well I penetrated into their world of sparks and canto-pop and just a wonderful experience I had never experienced before, not even in Johor Bahru. I wanted to document their stuff but with 15, I took something that wasn’t mine but personified it so that it was like my own story. That was a changing point for me.

Q: Can I follow up on 15 since we’re talking about it. I read a script of 15 because I was in the funding committee and I noticed that in the original script one of them was supposed to be a male prostitute serving female clients. In the film however, there was a scene that showed the boy in the shower but the client was a male. Why did you decide to make that change?

Royston: Well again it was based on some research and when we were reaching the point of filming, I started to hear some more news. Because it brings such a film even closer to date and there are a lot of “accidental” news which they leaked out to me which they are pretty comfortable to share. So I decided, “Okay, I’ll give it another spin.” And I wanted to contrast a lack of fatherly love and that sort of intimacy which they’re chasing. Makes the film even more twisted and complicated and in a way simple because they’re just seeking attention.

Q: I see that in your films you always have fish tanks. I was wondering if it means anything.

Royston: I’ve always wanted to work in a fish tank. (laughs) I think it’s a subconscious thing. I never realised it. I might need a psychiatrist for help. I mean just last night I met a group of friends who have never seen my films. They’re another group of ah-bengs but they’re grown up and they were asking me “How come all your films have plasters? There’s always a plaster in your films.” I didn’t realise it until someone told me.

Q: What other problems have you faced besides actors and conserving film?

Royston: I think the question can be answered in two levels. I think Gary can offer a perspective on the production side.

Gary: For the production aspect we can say $400,000 and you guys can say it’s a lot.

Royston: No they say it’s very little.

Gary: Oh, I thought I heard some of you say it’s a lot. Yeah, it was very little to play with. Language is also a problem, because Royston touched on Li Yuan, the boy and the Korean, Kim Young-Jun. He is actually a comedian in his hometown of Seoul. When we put this character for him to play, it was a challenge but he wanted to take it up. Royston was taking care of Li Yuan while I had to take care of Young-Jun. And he’d speak like spatters of English and overall it was a very big language barrier. A lot of times Royston would tell me in English or Mandarin, “This is what I want, blah blah blah.” When I explain it to the Korean actor, I would literally have to act it out for him to see and then he will follow. Other than that it’s your usual production or logistic problems. There’s no production that will go 100% smoothly.

Royston: There were also problems with the location. The house that you see is actually a house which is occupied by Bangladeshi workers and there was a huge mess and we sort of dressed it up. Before the production, the most complicating thing was to get funding. That was very tough because for a script like this, it’s destined not to make money. I was very lucky to be chosen by Pusan International Film Festival and NHK-Japan when they first saw the film and read the script they said “Okay. It’s a bit crazy. But we want to work with crazy people.” That’s where they came in and said we want to work with you. With that it sparked an interest in Singapore and we started working. In terms of working with the talents, we also tried to make it like a strategy game whereby in the film they are never close but when they’re not filming they cannot talk also. They’re not allowed to interact with one another. We wanted the tension. There was one time whereby they couldn’t take it anymore and they decided to make it a joke and started talking and then the footage didn’t turn out well and we decided to cancel the whole shoot. It affected them a little bit and they started to take this kind of torture very seriously. It was all building up to the finale where there was the awkwardness and the longing to be together. We wanted to create that fusion.

Q: It has a strange style of editing.

Royston: I think this whole film is told from the perspective of a little boy’s memory. And sometimes it’s like a movie, it’s editable. You edit the people you don’t want to see. The facts are true, but you distort it and that is what I wanted to do. Many times a film can be entertaining but it can also be thought-provoking. Like the relationship being like a father and son, that is one interpretation. It started off that way in the construction of the script and when it was finished we deconstructed the script again to make the audiences decide for themselves what relationship they are actually in. It was a great experience even in the film festivals there were people trying to find out what it was.

Gary: Different people were like guessing the little mysteries which we’re not sure you can pick up.

Royston: There’s one question that the whole world cannot answer. If you can answer that question I’ll give you a million dollars. Something is wrong with the date, something is missing. You can watch it another time.

Q: It’s the school holidays?

Royston: Yes, that’s one. But there’s another one. It’s a difficult question anyway. You might not be able to answer. I don’t have the one million dollars but anyway. So he wrote his diary on the 15th, 16th, 17th and 19th of Dec. Why is 18th of Dec missing? You have a month to get back to me. These are the little things we wanted the audience to rediscover.

Gary: And the DVD is out so you can buy it. (laughs)

Q: Some of my students have bought the DVD. One question they asked me was, “It looks like a gay film”. Is it one?

Royston: Well I think that it is when you think it is. Whether or not it is a gay film, I think it is a story about human relationships; the need to be intimate with one another. I think that is what I wanted to say. What I think is that it is very subjective because it’s coming out from the perspective of the kid. If it was an 18-year old teenager, the inclination would be clearer. But in this it is a little bit more grey and we wanted the audiences to fill in the missing gap.

Q: I notice in the credits, you list yourself in the story credit. But on the screenplay credit, you list a collaborator. So can you talk about how collaboration works when you feel like the story is yours and you are also the director of the film, what role does a writing collaborator play?

Royston: This one is a little bit complicated. What happened is that I’m not very good with writing. And usually my scripts are…

Gary: Three pages.

Royston: (laughs) Yeah, for 4:30 it was three pages long. So what I need is to get somebody else to make it into a 90 pages so that the investor can see it and I don’t have to follow it. I think to be fair to the person, Leong, I mean he helped me voice out my thoughts clearer because my script will always be “Boy goes to room”, “Boy sleeps”, “Boy goes to school”, “Boy comes back from home”. And it really doesn’t make sense.

Q: Did anything from your film come from your collaborator?

Royston: Mostly it was in mind already. That was just an assurance for the investors that it was not going to be just three minutes long.

Gary: Just to add to that point, it is very important for commercial purposes to have a proper screenplay written out because that is the first thing that an investor would want to look at. No matter how brilliant a director, they would still have to look through and get a good feel of the film.

Royston: When NHK wanted to invest in the film, they translated the 90-page script into Japanese and analysed it scene-by-scene and told me how they felt and that really helped me because even when I send e-mails, they are four sentences long, I’m not a very good correspondent.

Q: What about storyboarding?

Royston: (laughs) I do very detailed storyboarding which only I can understand.

Gary: I was the Assistant Director on set and I’ve seen his storyboards. They’re very detailed. (laughs) A man will be like two strokes, a girl will be a triangle.

Royston: It’s a good thing because while they were waiting for the shots to be set up, they would play “Charades”.

Gary: Yeah we would ask each other, “What’s this?”

Royston: The figures that I draw sometimes look like dogs and they would ask me why I had not informed them that they would need a dog on set. The boy was sleeping you see, and it looked like a puppy. But to answer your question, I’m quite a control-freak so to an extent I think I’m quite disciplined. I understood the constraints of the budget and what I did was to storyboard everything very carefully and on top of that I always have that 30% leeway whereby I allow things to happen in a natural way. But I always feel that when I want to do a film and it turns out to be a totally different product, that to me, could be a failure on my side.

Q: Do you have a fetish for numbers? Do your titles mean anything?

Royston: I really dig numbers that’s for sure. But I got F9s throughout secondary school for mathematics. As much as you might hate something, you’ll still have an interest towards it. And that made me want to explore the psychological aspect of numbers. And that’s how I got started. It started first as a coincidence. 15 because of the age and I wanted to associate gang names which were always in numbers. And 4:30 is a time thing. And the new film which is a clever play of numbers. It’s the name of the two actresses we are going to have. Again it’s sub-conscious.

Gary: Just to fill you in on a little trade secret. Normally all these film festivals, wherever you go they have these catalogues. Those films with numbers always come first. So the first page that you flip to… Ahh I mean that’s a plus point.

Royston: So now you know you can call your film 1 or 7. (laughs)

Q: Why the specific time 4:30?

Royston: On different psychological aspects according to my research, 4:30 is a time where the boy reacts and literally comes alive in the film. But according to medical surveys, 4:30 is the most difficult time for insomniacs around the world. That is also the time where most people commit suicide. To be more precise, it’s 4:29.something. Physically, it’s a very good number to establish his whereabouts. Metaphorically, his sense of loss.

Q: How did you manage to elicit such acting from a boy who’s so young and at that performance level?

Royston: I slapped him everyday. (laughs) Actually the little boy tortured me more than I tortured him. I think the level of trust between a director and an actor is very important. Before I started writing the script, I met up with him already. That was when he was ten years old. I told him that I had a script for him and that I would like to get to know him more. “Tell me your story, what makes you happy, who are the teachers you hate the most, if you hate your teacher what are the things that you would do?” Things like that. It helps me understand my actors.

Q: Is it right to say that essentially he is playing himself?

Royston: Yeah, I would say that. The challenge is how you can be playing yourself and yet not be honest. The challenge was to be very honest about himself and come out naked in front of the audience. That took a lot of trust. In fact, many months and years of establishing a relationship. The last scene which you saw, of him crying, that was the most difficult one to do, he broke his own record and it took 8 or 9 takes. On a 35mm, entire cans were gone because he literally did not want to act well as that was the last scene and after that take, the movie would be finished and that would be it. When I found out his reasons, it was a very moving experience. He finally decided and reconciled with the fact that this shot would be the end, the entire crew was very moved. The tears that came out from him were derived from a very painful experience. I can’t express it. I try not to see the scene every time. But the funny thing is every time my actors will run away from home. He just ran away from home 2 weeks ago. We’ve decided to work with older people for consequent films. Above 21.

Q: You have many lingering shots. Does it affect the actors’ performances if you rehearsed it over and over again for these long moments?

Royston: Normally for these shots we do not have rehearsals. Gary would give them rough descriptions and let them prepare themselves and we will just roll. For me, sometimes the first take is the best. And especially the two actors are trained. They have to unlearn many things which are spoiled by television. We are trying to eliminate those overly dramatic reactions.

Gary: Many times I think, we used the first take, although we have a second take.

Royston: Our second takes are normally for safety. The first takes are the best. It’s not perfect but genuine.

Q: I believe you said that all things are on screen for a reason. That in 4:30 there are many symbolisms. Can you probably explain why the use of orange juice and the dolly shot where we see the Korean man looking out the window and then we realise that the boy is also looking at him?

Gary: I think for us to explain the symbolism would be spoiling it for you.

Royston: Everything was placed in there to trigger a reaction. It was to move the audience in three different directions. I’m trying to be as careful as I can to not spoil your interpretation of the movie. As you can see, from the beginning of the film till the end, I’ve tried very hard to place the audience in the shoes of the boy so you would view it as “What would you do if you were in the boy’s situation?” When it was shown in Berlin, the audiences were saying that I had given them one of the toughest things to do because I was forcing them to re-look into their own lives through the eyes of the boy. That satisfied me because it was exactly what I wanted to achieve. A lot of punk rockers came to the screening in Berlin, expecting a sequel of 15. But they had a heart attack. (laughs)
Gary: Such an extreme difference.

Q: There is a scene in both 15 and 4:30 that reminds us of 12 Storeys and Mee Pok Man respectively. In 15, the part where there is this girl who jumps and the boys look at her, it repeats the scene in 12 Storeys where the female character sees the man jump. In 4:30, the last scene has the boy blackening the windows like the last scene of Mee Pok Man where Jon Ng covers the windows with bed sheets.

Royston: Definitely not. I hate Eric Khoo. (laughs) To tell you the truth I have not seen Mee Pok Man. I failed to be able to pass off as a 21-year old when I was 17 to get into a screening of Mee Pok Man. It’s traumatising to be stopped by the usher even when you have on a drawn-on moustache. Eric told me we have a synergy and share a certain kind of sensibility that’s why he was drawn to all my short films because of the themes that we were always trying to explore. The jumping from the building is the ultimate way of portraying suicide that is uniquely Singaporean. Just last year, someone jumped down from my block. During my youth, I had many peers who jumped. That is in my experience, something we see everyday. Out of ten suicides a day, the papers just cover one.

Q: Do you guys have a festival strategy for the film?

Gary: Our films are quite lucky in a sense. Even before our films are done, we get enquiries from various festivals. Royston’s first film premiered in Venice so once it starts travelling the film festival circuit, a lot of these festival programmers will be on the lookout for subsequent projects. It helps that every year you go to film markets and you meet these film programmers and they ask about any new projects and you really get bookings from various festivals. And it helps when a distributor from overseas, a world sales agent has decided to pre-sale your films. They have automatic connections to all the film festivals. They already have planned which festival should premiere your film. 4:30, the company picked Berlin and Cannes because of the sensibility of the film. Berlin, there is the appreciation for these types of art house films. Whereas for Venice they like films with a good sense of colour, pace, so even for festivals there are different sensibilities.

Q: Where have your films been shown commercially?

Gary: Locally, 15 and 4:30 are under Shaw. Overseas, 15 has been shown in UK, US, Australia and Canada. 4:30 has gone to as far as Israel, Norway, Korea (TV), France and UK.

Royston: For the DVDs, we suspect that all the buyers are Singaporean. (laughs) The distributor was quite surprised that 15 had gone into its third reprint already. So right now the cover for 15 is a brand new one that we have never seen before. So whoever who bought 15 on the Net, thank you.

Gary: Through Amazon.com it would get through. Others sources it wouldn’t. We went to Shanghai last year. And they did a pirated version of 15 with their own CD layout and booklet. (laughs) It’s quite impressive that people in China would know of this film.

Royston: Actually their stuff is quite good. (laughs) They have a special 4-page booklet which I don’t know where they found from. They did their own work.

Q: As an artist, what do you think of piracy?

Royston: Well it very complicating for me.

Gary: There are two ways of looking at it.

Royston: There are two ways. Especially for a place like Singapore, without piracy, I wouldn’t be able to watch those art house films with censorship and a lot of stuff. Honestly, I’m not rich enough to buy these art house films or go to film festivals. So the best thing would be to go to JB and buy. If our censorship is more lax, which it is now, we’ll be exposed to more films and that would help us a lot. For example it is so difficult to get Kieslowski’s films in Singapore. Or look for more obscure Icelandic filmmakers. When I first saw Y Tu Mama Tambien, I was very surprised when I saw the film. They cut one of the most important scenes away which actually changed the whole meaning of the film. It was the threesome and I didn’t know. I thought they suddenly just got bored of one another. I am an unofficial supporter of pirated films.

Q: Speaking of censorship, did you have any problems with the censors for 4:30?

Royston: Not so much, in fact I think the Board of Censors were quite happy. They weren’t expecting such a gentle film.

Q: I’m surprised they did not cut the portion of the snipping of the pubic hair.

Royston: Trust me, we had our fair share of the issue, we just don’t want to bring it up anymore. They let it go a little bit.

Gary: That’s why it’s M18 instead of a PG.

Royston: They were very kind to me on this film.

Q: What are your plans? Are you thinking of making a commercial film?

Royston: Should we tell them of our new project?

Gary: Yeah, sure. Why not?

Royston: To tell you the truth, I’m shooting my new film in March. It’s going to be a getai musical. So this time we’re going to try elevate something different. We’re using all the classic Hokkien songs and giving it a fresh new spin on it. Again, it’s a total departure from 4:30 and 15. I wanted to surprise the audiences. I think I’m a chameleonic director and I always want to give my audiences something new. It’s an all-female cast except for one male.

Gary: But he cannot talk.

Royston: So it’s female-powered and the tables are turned this time.

Q: So what number this time?

Gary: (laughs) It’s called 881.

Royston: We’re playing with this number because the main characters are called the “Papaya Sisters”. 881 – Pa-pa-ya, Ba ba yao (Mandarin). It’s a story of the “Papaya Sisters”. They wanted not to be superstars but superstars in the getai environment.

Q: I realised that when the National Museum was opening you did something for them. Do you have like a love-hate relationship with the government now or are you back in their good graces so now you’re the “Bad boy of cinema” outside of Singapore?

Gary: Somehow I think the media played it up.

Royston: I’m trying to blame the media but the government body is made up of different bodies. There are some bodies which are more biased against me, there are some which really love me and there are some which can’t wait to get rid of me and some which spend a lot of money to get ISD to investigate into my entire life. I’m glad there’s this sort of friction actually, it helps. I really ask myself what I want to do before acting on anything. I think some of my best works are done in the most painful period of my life. 4:30 came from that kind of isolation when I first encountered a lot of issues. I even had to leave the country for a short while. Actually it’s quite a nice experience. I am running a fever now but seeing the audience here, the turn-out, I feel very happy.

Q: Which directors influenced you the most? I can see a little of Tsai Ming-Liang and Wong Kar-Wai. Are there any particular movies which inspired you?

Royston: I think Wong Kar-Wai played a very big role. When I was in a polytechnic, he was like a God whom film students would worship. That set the foundation for me. The director I really like is actually Ed Wood which is so different from what I have done.

Gary: But there’s a similar spirit.

Royston: Determination, I guess. That helped me a lot to know that he had a limited budget and yet he’s been labelled as one of the world’s most prominent directors and yet he’s still making films and that really drove me to continue making films.

Q: How long did it take you to film the movie?

Royston: The production took 15 days. The actors were kept in separate rooms. Even when they’re eating they’re kept apart. We even created a human barrier so they wouldn’t have the chance to interact with one another. It was a little bit of a psychological torture for them.

Q: How did NHK come in on this?

Royston: Japan has the NHK fund whereby they will go all over the world looking for projects to finance. What they did was to go to all the major film festivals. I presume that everyone here is a film student right? No engineers? (laughs) So what you do is write a script, like Rotterdam has the Hubert Bals, Pusan has the PPP, Hong Kong has the HAF where all the major film investors will come and evaluate your projects. Every festival would take about 20 projects and from that, they will pick one. The best way is to secure an overseas funding which would help create a local interest because they’re more assured. 4:30 was a tough fight. It was against two other directors and then they narrowed it down to a Malaysian director, I can’t remember his name. In the end they went with 4:30 which we were very happy about.

Q: Royston, you get a lot of media coverage. How do you feel about the writers who do write about you who are in a way, using you over the cause of anti-censorship?

Royston: I think only as you get older, you start to realise it. All that censorship issue was too much for me then, when I was only 24. I was really lost to the point that I asked the reporter to tell me what to say. Now I’m really careful. I try to be truthful and a little bit more tactful especially recently there was a surprise attack from Australia. They claimed they interviewed me, but it didn’t happen at all. They wrote an entire article on anti-censorship and sent it to MDA, stating that I had things I didn’t actually say and that created a big issue. In moments like these, it taught me to be very careful. I think now, being a grown-up, I’ve learnt to protect myself. What they’re very good in is to lift phrases from entire segments like “I hate censorship” and that’s it.

Q: In your films, there is a great sense of realism. Did the boy really take the cough syrup and in 15, were they taking real drugs and did they really cut themselves?

Royston: No, the cough syrup was actually prune juice. We thought that he was too young to really take the real thing. For 15, what happened was that they were each given a handicam to film whatever they wanted. At first they gave me footages of themselves, they wanted to impress and shock me. But after 2 months of doing the same thing, they got tired and that was where they got real to themselves and that was the moment we were waiting for. We saw them cutting themselves for maybe one and a half minutes but they do this everyday. What wasn’t revealed to the audience was the new trend of cutting their abdomens. In the past when I used to cut my wrists, people could see it. It’s like a pity vote. But now, if I were to cut my abdomen, there’s a greater thrill because it’s all fats and the blood will just flow profusely. For the swallowing of the condom with drugs, it was substituted with sweets. It actually happened to one of the boys but we swapped the boys to protect his identity. We could get help to get real drugs but we didn’t want to because we were worried about safety issues. In the actual swallowing, the condom actually burst. This is something I had to be really careful about. I know it’s in my social responsibility so I actually finished the whole thing myself to demonstrate that it was okay before he did it. When you saw the boy do it in 15, it was done solely on the observation of me doing it. He copied me, the tears, the swallowing. He immersed himself entirely in the role. As a director, I need to be responsible. I would not get my actors to do something I would not do. It didn’t take much to get him to do it because I just demonstrated it in front of him.

Q: Why did you feel you had to prolong that shot for so long? It seemed like exploitation to me.

Royston: I think progression is very important to me. It was needed to show that kind of pain that they had to go through. I think everything is exploitation. Be it a love story, a charity programme, you’re manipulating the audience’s sympathy. In everything you do, there’s exploitation. What is your objective of exploitation? Is it a positive objective? It’s something I always ask myself. To do 15 was painful. It doesn’t feel good to see the actors cutting or piercing themselves. 5 scenes were deleted from the film. I thought that would be too much.

Q: I’m really glad that you showed what you did but I felt it was a lack of discipline to keep it at that long.

Royston: Perhaps it was the intensity that I wanted to make you feel. If I shortened it by half, it would have been a more pleasurable experience for you but I wanted the audience to feel “super” uneasy with it. The fact that for $200 to smuggle the drugs, the kind of pain you have to go through, that is something which is prevalent in the youth culture now. That kind of risk you go through for a few hundred dollars was something I wanted to show, the sort of process they go through. I mean it’s an instant death sentence to be caught.

Q: As a director, what kind of homework do you do in terms of visualising your scenes to create what we eventually see on screen?

Royston: For me, I have a very different way of working. If I’m doing a film about classical music, I would go to Zouk to look for inspiration. I need stimulants basically, things that are completely opposite to stimulate me to think in a different way. For 4:30, I basically went to clubs to look for that sense of peace and quickly start writing what I feel. When you go to clubs there’s this unified loneliness coming together, that made me take the lateral way of thinking and plot the graph down into a simple story.

Q: There’s a lot of networking you have to do in terms of meeting influential people to get money for your films, or marketed and distributed. So how much of that do you do or do you leave it to Gary or Eric?

Royston: I think Gary has a more approachable face. People see me and they get frightened so…

Gary: We sort of split the work load. For festivals and film markets, I would go. But those aren’t the fun ones. Royston goes to the fun ones.

Royston: I’m mostly there to interact with the audience, for the Q & A. After that you get drunk in the party, I’m quite famous for that.

Gary: With regards to your question, it’s also a build up of his track record. It’s not overnight that he got all the funds. If you’ve watched Royston’s shorts, he’s done many short films. I think 22. And now these films we send it for festivals, so it didn’t come as an overnight success. Even 15 was made from a short film. Also his stories, the kind of things that it taps into, and his visual style, Eric from Zhao Wei Films picked it up and wanted to develop 15. After 15, he had something to show to investors that he had short films and a feature film and it helps that it won awards as well.

Royston: I always like to suggest to aspiring filmmakers, don’t make your first feature immediately after you graduate. It would be very tough to get funding and also, you can never make your first feature film again. Gain more experience first with shorts and gain more credibility. I’m not saying that you should use it as a marketing tool, but it is a marketing tool and it can be very helpful.

Gary: It helps to train you as a director.

Royston: Had I not had my short films I think I would have a harder time getting funding. Before doing 15, the first thing the investors wanted to know was how many short films has he done.

Gary: It helps to provide a visual reference, style.

Moderator: Any last words you would like to say before we end this conversation?

Gary: I would like to thank all of you for coming. I hope you liked the film and that you will support our next film. If you didn’t understand the film, buy the DVD (laughs). And not many people know this but Zhao Wei Films has an open dialogue with new filmmakers. We receive scripts all the time and I spend a lot of time reading through each of them. If we see anything good, we’d like to help the filmmakers. So if you have any scripts, do send it to us, we’ll read it and if we’re interested in it, maybe we could help you out.

Royston: It’s very wonderful to see such a great turnout. As I’ve said before, 4:30 is a very personal film for me and it’s nice to see all of you here experiencing the journey with me. It makes the world a less lonely place, you know, I made this film for the kid in all of us. And I dedicate it to the kid in all of us. Before making the film I told Eric that if I cannot complete the film within the allotted time I would quit filmmaking because it’s so personal. By the way I have a blog, but it isn’t written by me. I don’t know this person but he goes by the alias, the Bodyguard. Do comment on it, it’s roystone-tan.blogspot.com. Thank you everyone.

Transcript by Athalia Ho Mei Xi and Lim Lung Chieh. Both missing in action.

Singapore Dreaming is a local film by husband-and-wife filmmaking team, Colin Goh and Woo Yen Yen. The film was opened in Singapore towards the end of 2006 and was inherently touted as one of the most affective and accurate pictures of the Singaporean community. The publicity materials of the film even boasts a short review by President S.R Nathan, President of Singapore, that Singapore Dreaming represented ‘Life in its reality’. So, is Singapore Dreaming a truly Singaporean Film?

As I thought about these words, I came to one understanding. It is true that the film was one that stood out and was in its unique way different from the many Singaporean movies that have existed. For one, they had a quote from President Nathan… alright, but on a deeper level, I feel that Singapore Dreaming is a film that represents the Singaporean Voice most accurately.

The sincerity in which the directors portrayed in wanting to comment on the Singaporean Culture was probably one of the key reasons why the film was rather effective and affective to many. According to the filmmakers, the film was first inspired and conceptualised by an essay they wrote for the Singapore International Foundation, with its contents about how the ‘Singaporean Dream’ was slowly turning into the ‘Singaporean Plan’ instead. According to Colin, the duo felt that the “dream which everyone shares about attaining personal fulfilment, has been transformed into the Singapore Plan, with prescribed steps of what kind of school you should go to, what degree you should get, what career you should pursue, maybe even who you should marry”. Fuelled by the heart warming responses of many in Singapore who felt the same way and came forward to share their own personal lives, the couple decided to make a film based on these stories which they received.

I am also glad that Singapore Dreaming was not at all restrictive and self-censored in displaying an accurate side (although this may mean a side which most of us are not proud of) of the Singaporean Society, in order to bring these stories to life.

Singapore Dreaming is a satire of the obsessions of the middle-class Singaporean, told through a quintessentially mellow approach. When compared to films by Jack Neo, who is also an active ‘commentator’ about the Singaporean Society in his films, Colin Goh and Woo Yen Yen has achieved a much mature approach in discussing Singaporean issues. The humour written in Singapore Dreaming is far from the clichéd ‘slapstick’ humour generated from the quirky and sometimes unnatural acting by the actors in Jack Neo’s movies. The humour in Singapore Dreaming is instead a more intellectual one. For example, the communication gaps between the mother and the father, seen through one of the scenes where the father asks for the mother to mock up a quick club interview, is done tastefully. Due to her ignorance and Chinese background, the first thing the mother asks is ‘Have you eaten?’, which is something accurate to how the local Chinese generally greet each other. In my opinion, using humour with a local context is a good approach to writing this film and in tackling the presentation of the local characteristics of our community.

The film also introduces a typical Singaporean Family and how the individual members relate to each other. The family dynamics portrayed in the film is one that can be easily related to. In the case of this film, we have characters like the patient ‘mother’, who patiently picks up after the family without complains, the ‘father’, that demands respect and authority in the family (even when his children are old enough to start a family of their own), the favored and spoilt child of the family (usually a boy) and the daughter who suffers silently with the issue of biasness. In my opinion, these are the characters which many in Singapore would easily relate to as they are all so applicable, even to their relatives and friends.

These personalities were also well explored and developed through each of their reactions to Seng’s (Dick Su) return from Idaho, where he apparently went to study in. From this small event, we could see the Mother clearing up the family’s mess to prepare for her son’s return, the father trying to exude authority by constantly announcing, ‘I have brought up such a successful son’ and the daughter who is mildly bitter from the opportunity that Seng was given. This is of course achieved through proper story development by the Colin and Yen Yen.

I have always believed that the true nature of men, and in particular the true Singaporean nature, will surface when a conflict or a drastic event is forced onto the individuals. In my opinion therefore, Colin and Yen Yen’s decision to inflict the father’s death in the story and their act of bringing up the potential lost of financial stability in the family, helped to display and explore what the Singaporean voice is like. It was also a spot-on for me that the issue was very much because of financial problems as ‘money’ is something I feel, which is close to many Singaporeans’ heart. The struggle for the son to sustain his spending habits and the sibling rivalry that occurs due to the conflict over who should get what portion of the father’s assets is indeed a familiar story for many in Singapore. This has allowed for the film to explore how Singaporeans would react in family related situations and how things are solved.

If there was a Singapore New Wave, maybe our films can be distinguished by the true Singaporean voice present in it, a voice that would shout to the world about our Singaporean lives, our Singaporean families or maybe just simply, us, Singaporeans. What makes a Singaporean film a truly Singaporean one? It might just be the fact that our voices can be distinguished and heard in the particular film, and I think that Singapore Dreaming particularly, is a great representation of this.

This review was written by Josiah Ng. We can’t find his details right now. So if you want to contact him, go make yourself a cup of joe.

Focusing on a 20 year old boy’s uniquely silent vision of everyday life, as well as his reactions to a female interest, Smell of Rain had brilliant cinematography and direction which is almost quite unheard of from Singaporean Films. The film has a backbone strong enough to keep the film paced and spaced well enough throughout its one and a half hours of screen time due to its experienced directorial debut of Gloria Chee. Rather impressive is also her passion for the elements in the story that is obvious from the choices of shots and decisions in the film’s structure.

Comparing Smell of Rain to film history, it isn’t a groundbreaking masterpiece of a drama, it isn’t something particularly original as well. The twist of the story even has a familiar feel to it. And as powerful as the opening dialogue that opens the film with high expectations and potential, you cant help but feel that the film could’ve been a tad more powerful or interesting in content. It had all the right elements to make it a technical and stylistic success but it still had a tinge of substancial cliché that kept it from going forward.

That being said, Smell of Rain is definitely a must-see for its visuals of Singapore that you can hardly recognize. Watch it for the acting that remains full throughout the slow pace of the film. Watch it to capture the director’s original essence that was meant to be showcased. Watch Smell of Rain, for the very importance that keeps filmmakers going to finally get it right. A stepping stone in its own way. A pedestal worth respecting with its budget.