I love watching movies and occasionally, I write about them, but the thought of actually making one never really crossed my mind. Still, when the opportunity to do so came along, it was just too tempting to pass up. This also seemed to be the case for my fellow coursemates, which included a home-maker, teacher-to-be, student, tv host, as well as one who was already in the industry. Everyone had some degree of passion for film but simply never had a chance to fully explore it.

So there we were, at a full-time, four-week course on HD filmmaking offered by Objectifs - Centre for Photography and Filmmaking. I wasn’t quite prepared for how intense or rewarding it would be. The course covered every aspect of filmmaking from scripting, directing, camera handling, lighting, sound, casting, acting (Note to M: I haven’t signed the release form yet!), scheduling, budgeting, editing and even marketing. We also watched a lot of local short films spanning the gamut of genres from drama to comedy to experimental to music videos to animation. At the end of each module, we would rethink our films and arrived at the conclusion that the perfect (ie. easiest to complete) film was one with no actors, no dialogue, maybe a voice-over or subtitles, shot only with ambient light, with no complicated camera-work, all wrapped up in a pretty dvd box for distribution to festivals.

We had the privilege of learning from instructors who were in the business of making films and enjoyed their anecdotes and inside stories even as they strove to impart the technical aspects of movie-making to us. Without a doubt, this had to be some of the most accommodating and patient people we’d ever come in contact with. So once again, thank you! I wondered if it was the fact that nobody seemed to have gotten into the business to make money but rather, had done so because film was a passion that could not be denied. This passion shaped their attitudes and sensibilities and their dealings with others. Either that or they had worked with far more unreasonable people and dealing with newbie filmmakers was a walk in the park.

The fact that we would be using HD equipment was something of a coup since most filmmakers start off shooting on digital tape (as opposed to film). The import of this was lessened for us somewhat simply because as first-time film-makers, we had no basis of comparison. At times, the inconveniences and technical complications hardly seemed worth it. Shooting on HD meant storing data on P2 cards, with a capacity of only 4 minutes per card, or 8 minutes in total given the two slots. Gone was the luxury of a 60-minute tape and nearly limitless takes. On the other hand, it helped to instill a certain discipline in shooting. Also, the limited capacity of the P2 cards meant that data had to be transferred to a P2 store. It made one feel very vulnerable, to have one’s precious footage sitting in an external drive and open to corruption and/or loss during all the transferring of data. I admit though that the final footage looked beautiful.

It seems counter-intuitive, but shooting turned out to be the shortest part of the entire filmmaking process. Pre-production, including location-scouting, prop-gathering, casting etc etc and post-production, mainly editing, took up much more time. But in a sense, everything was geared towards the shooting process. Pre-production was all about ensuring a smooth shoot, while post-production was all about salvaging whatever had been shot into a cohesive that’s-what-I–had-in-mind-all-along final product. (Note to self: Never ever use scrolling credits again.)

Filmmaker Robert Bresson said that a film is born three times – in the writing, the shooting and the editing. (“My movie is born first in my head, dies on paper; is resuscitated by the living persons and real objects I use, which are killed on film but, placed in a certain order and projected on to a screen, come to life again like flowers in water.”) It was hence immensely satisfying to have been equipped with the skills for all three forms of birth from the course. Not to mention being able to type out for the credits “Written, Directed and Edited By.” This meant though that a three-headed monstrosity could not be blamed on three different personalities but was the sole responsibility of one.

Now that I’ve experienced first-hand the sheer amount of work that goes into a (short) film, can I still be so cavalier as to pass summary judgment on what I watch? Well, if I must, I must.

(For sinema.sg)

Ha Noi

Went to the Dong Xuan market in the morning, which was reminiscent of the old Chinatown market. Final bowl of rice vermicelli (14kd) on the sidewalk. Quick stop at PhoCo Café (2 Hang Dong) for Ha Noi’s weakest coffee and tiniest toilet. Bought a kilo of the teeny-tiny tangerines (20kd) to bring home and then it was back to the hotel to pack up to catch the 1.30 pm flight home.

I remember Ha Noi from a trip four years ago as a laidback and idyllic town. That’s no longer true. While it doesn’t quite feel like a city given the lack of tall buildings, the energy surging through the place was palpable. The streets thronged with motorbikes and the air was filled with ceaseless cacophonous klaxoning and pungent exhaust which residents battled against with face-masks. Wafting among the wooziness-inducing fumes were the tempting smells of food hawked by street peddlers. Life spilled onto the sidewalks as people ate, drank and gossiped on the little plastic stoops. Women (it was almost always women) sold anything that could be carried in woven baskets and balanced on a pole slung over the shoulders. We walked a lot in Ha Noi and I loved the fact that every different street promised something new in sights and smells. Even walking on different sides of the same street threw up something new. As long as crossing it didn't result in any bodily harm. It took a little getting used to, but the trick to navigating oncoming traffic was to move slowly and maintain eye contact, and let them manoeuvre around you. Or as P put it, just channel your inner third-world being.

This could definitely be a place to visit again. But next time, with a face-mask.

Ha Noi

Fruitful shopping on Le Duan including a Party shirt (50kd) and a pair of slip-ons (180kd from opening price of 350kd).
Had made reservations at Sofitel Metropole’s Le Beaulieu for brunch, but a screw-up in the reservations meant that we ended up at Le Club instead. Oh well, it did mean paying US$35 (US$46 a person all in) instead of forking out US$68. The spread was not very wide but happily, the lack of variety was not an indication of the quality. There were oysters, parma ham and melon, crayfish, lobster, fresh vegetables, cheeses and desserts (ice-cream, chocolates, apple pie, log cake, mousse, fruits). The only disappointment was the bland sushi.

Managed to make it to Café Pho Co (11 Hang Gai), dubbed the secret café by the New York Times, before sunset. From the street, one sees a gallery and a small sign for a café. The narrow walkway opens up into a courtyard which seems to be part of an old Chinese mansion. Seating, reached by spiral staircases, is haphazardly found on the second, third and fourth floors, which offer a bird’s eye view of Hoan Kiem lake. Enjoyed an ice coffee as the sun set.

Finally located Ipa-nima, which had just moved in December to 34 Han Thuyen (http://www.ipa-nima.com/). The girls luxuriated in handbag heaven while I enjoyed the comfy couch and the thoroughly well-designed store.
Met up with the Ts and Ds for dinner at Nam Phuong (19 Pho Phan Chu Trinh, LP). The food had the tasty simplicity of homecooked food and was the perfect final dinner in Ha Noi. We had raw spring rolls, shrimp with banana flower salad, cuttlefish with chilli and lemongrass, beef stir fried with pepper, pork patties grilled with honey, pork and eggs in coconut juice, kale in XO sauce and for dessert, caramel custard and banana fritters.

Ha Noi

Walked to Van Mieu (Temple of Literature) after cyclo negotiations fell through. Le Duan turned out to be another excellent street to explore on foot with shops selling communist party wear and headgear, sneakers, as well as bun cha, grilled pork patties I remembered well from my previous trip.

Spent a pleasant morning at Vietnam’s first university. Spotted a photographer art directing two ao dai-clad ladies (one in green, one in red) and wondered if it was for a tourist calendar.
Lunch was at KOTO (59 Van Mieu, LP), which provides training for street kids. Tired of the no-ice/water rule and ordered the KOTO smoothie (banana, mint, passionfruit) and a ham baguette with salad, as well as coffee and carrot cake (200kd). Happy to report that there were no untoward consequences.

Followed the LP walking tour of the old quarter. Each street offered new treats for the senses, though Hang Ma stood for combining your Christmas and afterlife needs in one convenient location. Was woozy from the sights and sounds and exhaust fumes and refueled with Vietnamese tea at Moca Café (14 Pho Na Tro, LP), located on a lane of chic shopping facing St Joseph’s Cathedral.

Had street food for dinner. Spotted this set-up doing roaring business on Hang Buom, with tables lined up on both sides of the street. Had fried beef noodles, oily and yummy (15kd), and Hanoi beer (20kd). Also ate the raw cucumber (dipped in prune powder and salt) and pickled cucumber side-dish.

Came across this tiny shop (93 Hang Bac, http://www.thuyhiensilk.com/) which packed an impressive assortment of bags as well as other souvenirs. Bought two silk sleeping bags (total 160kd).
It seemed that the whole of Ha Noi was surging towards Hoan Kiem lake on Christmas Eve, and we caught glimpses of a few spurts of fireworks. Balloon-sellers stood in the middle of the street clutching their wares as the crowd thronged and swirled while on the sidewalks, peddlers sold popcorn, candy floss, grilled corn, grilled cuttlefish, fried sausages, fruit.
Had a nightcap at Latino Bar at Melia Hanoi. (US$5 for Bailey’s on the rocks.) Glad to break away from the human mass and get off the smoggy streets.

Ha Long/Ha Noi

Spent a cold, uncomfortable night trying to get to sleep and was woken up at 5, this time by barking dogs. Extremely glad to be returning to Hanoi and Green Park Hotel, where one could at least have a decent shower even if the room smelled of cigarette smoke.
Breakfast was baguette with butter and jam, fried eggs, banana and coffee. Accompanied by the thunderous beat of disco blaring from next door. Which was P and S’s wake-up call.
Spent a lazy morning on the boat enjoying the scenery as it slowly wound its way through Ha Long bay back to the city.

Lunch back in Ha Long city at a joint that was part of APT travel’s (Your pleasure’s our success!) network. More of the same, including potato with pork and fries.
Then a long nap before reaching Ha Noi around 4 pm. Replenishment was at Fanny’s (48 Pho Le Thai To, LP). Picked durian and com (young sticky rice) for an ice-cream version of the Thai dessert. Other delicious flavours tried included ginger, dark chocolate, gren tea. Came to about 35kd, including coffee. As I was about to drink from the glass of water, J’s horrified stare stopped me. But it turned out that S had already done so but no one had even noticed her raising glass to lips. At which point we promised to watch S like a hawk.

Went in search of Ipa-nima (LG) after that, but the number did not compute. The address given was 59G but the trail stopped short at 59D with no handbag heaven in sight. So we had dinner instead, at Brothers Café (26 Pho Nguyen Thai Hoc, LP). It was supposedly set in a 250-year old Buddhist temple, but little trace of that remained from the admittedly elegant restoration. The buffet (220kd) was above average and my favourite was the crab vermicelli.

Ha Long Bay/Cat Ba Island

Woken up by a crowing rooster. At 5 am. Too tired for it to bother me too much.
Breakfast at the hotel had pho (yay! though the beef was tough) along with the usual continental spread. Then a 3-hour ride to Ha Long city to catch the boat. The journey was broken up with a toilet/souvenir shop break where minivans spewing tourists squeezed into a small parking lot. “10th/11th century” relics were cavalierly displayed in dusty cases and going for a steal at a couple of hundred dollars.
Operation Ha Long continued at the jetty as tour agents settled the tickets and herded us about. Trolley bags in hand, we clambered over another boat to get to ours. No sweat, though the boats did begin to drift apart as S was straddled across them. Lunch was served on board, simple but satisfying: cucumber, fish, tofu, green veggies and fried spring rolls. Lounged on the upper deck after that.

The Ha Long bay experience sometimes seemed like a composite of past tours – cruising down Lijiang, drifting on a bamboo raft in Yangshuo, with shades of Longqingxia thrown in. The sense of déjà vu was particularly strong with the visit to the limestone caves. The admittedly impressively-sized Thien Cung Grotto was lit “in the Chinese style,” which meant a garish array of multi-coloured lights.

As it was low tide when we reached Cat Ba island, we had to transfer onto a smaller boat to get ashore. “Like refugees!” gaily commented one of the uncles in our group. The ride to the bay area from the jetty was soundtracked by what could conceivably be Vietnamese folk music/opera. We were deposited at Nam Duong hotel and opted for rooms on the 5th floor (two rooms with 2 twin beds as opposed to a 3-1 split). Hiked up the stairs to our rooms and found lovely views of the sunset from the hallway. Found out later that the other half of the group ended up in a hotel with no seaview, though they could have gotten up close and personal with the hill if they so wished from their windows.

Cat Ba in off-peak season brought to mind Tossa del Mar and Viareggio. We plonked ourselves down on a bench and watched the sun go down while snacking on dao (tiny apples with a crunchy bite) and tiny tangerines (very sweet and flavourful). Dinner back at the hotel was a variation of lunch: beans, better fish, calamari, tomatoes fried with egg, soup. Shared table with retiree from France who was traveling with his wife?/mistress?/girlfriend?
Checked out the beach after dinner. Found two campfires going on: one with disco music blaring and tentative dancing, while the other was much more sedate.

We returned to the bay area to find Cat Ba stirring. There were kids everywhere, men hanging out by the shopfronts, young men and women cruising down the grandiosely broad boulevards. We decided that their principal form of entertainment was klkk, kia lai kia kih, or ‘walk here, walk there.’ “Hey, how’s it going?” “Well, we’ve just kl, now we’re gonna kk!”
There were also massage parlours, karaoke joints, street peddlers (selling pearls, clothing, food), cafes and even the odd disco or two. The Flightless Bird (LP) was full so we settled for flashing-ball-of-light café instead. And watched in disbelief as S poured her coffee into a glass after we had had a conversation about the perils of ice the previous night. Despite pouring the coffee back out, it was too late, and S ended up with an upset stomach. So much for rocking the Cat Ba.

Ha Noi

First thought as the plane was landing: boy, the air sure was hazy. But at least it wasn’t raining. Took a cab into the city (US$10 or 160,000 dong) to Green Park Hotel (http://www.hotel-greenpark.com/). It took a while since the driver didn’t seem to know where it was located. Good thing it was a flat fare.
After depositing our luggage, the first order of business was lunch. The hotel’s recommendation was Pho 24, which was too clean and proper for our liking. Decided to amble over to the old quarter instead where we finally settled on a place on Pho Ly Quoc Su. Alas, given that the copy of Lonely Planet I was lugging along was of the 2001 vintage, we found no sign of pho at the given address. The place we eventually ate at had only pho ga, bird flu be damned. Besides, the outbreak was in the south. Had a most satisfying late lunch (15k dong a bowl).


Moseyed around the area after and took in St Joseph’s Cathedral. One of the strangest sights in Ha Noi was seeing people all decked out in winter wear: woolen caps, scarves, puffy jackets, coats with faux fur trimming. It was enough to make one sweat just looking at them.


The girls went in search of a tailor and ended up at Lotus (89 Hang Gai, Luxe Guide) for made-to-measure ao dais etc.
Coffee break was at Trung Nguyen (20 Pho Hang Mam, LP). Figured if an LP recommendation was still around, it had to be good. Had a cup of chon, aka weasel poop coffee (12kd), which was very thick and very sweet, a definite pick-me-upper.
Signed up for a Ha Long Bay package at Kangaroo Café on Hang Be, found out later it was a rip-off of the original cafe on Pho Bao Khanh. Not that it made a difference. We were happy that the US$30 2 day/1 night Ha Long/Cat Ba package was cheaper than the US$45 quoted by the hotel. There were packages offering a night onboard the boat but we needed to stay on land given J’s motion sickness.
Dinner was at Green Tangerine (48 Hang Be, LG), which served French food in a lovely little courtyard. Enjoyed the pork fillet and the apple and mango crumble. P ordered the fig’s fritter with gorgonzola cheese, which was very good. The scallops were nicely done, though the presentation was rather fussy with the pieces laid out on a chess board of vegetables surrounded by curlicues of mashed potato. S’s five delicacies dessert platter sounded more enticing than it tasted. Waiter was a little snooty though. US$20 each.

What’s Going On…?
Eason Chan
One of Eason's great strengths is his versatility as a vocalist. Unfortunately, that can make for rather scattered albums. Lead single 裙下之臣 'Don't We All Love Dresses' (I think 'Slave to the Dress' would be more to the point) is an ode to women, and, unusually enough, promiscuity. Accordingly, it's one of 2 tracks deleted from the mainland China release. I guess married men in entertainment do get away with double standards.
The heart of the album though, is the two songs 富士山下 and 不如不见. 富士山下 is a lush, gorgeous piece of music, matched with lyrics about a love that's not meant to be, with Mount Fuji looming in the backdrop. It's not an easy song to get a handle on: it's wordy and the lines run into each other with barely a break, but Eason floats along with the words effortlessly, letting 林夕's poetic if sometimes obtuse (then again, it's probably a function of my poor Cantonese) lyrics breathe.
不如不见 has a lovely, wistful melody by 陈小霞, the kind she's so good at writing. 林夕's lyrics didn't seem too promising at first. For some reason, there's this annoying habit of lyricists referencing their own past work, so 十年 is mentioned in the lyrics and in fact, the entire theme seems to be 想哭 redux. And yet, the lyrics and music work together and Eason's quietly affecting delivery is the unexpected sound of heartbreak.
Elsewhere, lyricist extraordinaire 林夕 shows his chops on a track titled Akira Kurosawa. Well, not exactly, the Chinese characters 黑择明 literally mean darkness chooses light. From this pun, 林夕 has fashioned lyrics about life and death infused with imagery of the cinema. Most impressive.

Singapore Animation Showcase @ Animation Nation 2006

I grew up on a steady diet of animation that included anime dubbed in English and Mandarin, as well as cartoons from the West, primarily from the US. But it wasn’t until much later that the world of animation opened up for me. Primarily, this was due to a re-acquaintance with anime, which, I realised, could be funny, tragic, mysterious, sexy, simple, profound — with a bewildering array of styles to match. There wasn’t anything that anime couldn’t do.

So I was glad to see animation taking on a higher profile here in recent years. This is the Singapore Film Society’s third Animation Nation, while the Singapore Animation Showcase goes back to 2001, held under the auspices of the then-Singapore Broadcasting Authority.
There also appear to be more avenues for aspiring animators to break into the business, both in terms of the number of educational courses offered and production houses sprouting up here, most notably Lucasfilm Animation. So I was curious to see, as the publicity material promised for the Singapore Animation Showcase (organised as part of Animation Nation 2006 on November 19, 2006), what “local Singaporean animators have been up to.”

Most of the offerings at the Showcase were from schools, which was fine, but I would like to have seen more from the professionals in the industry. For instance I saw some interesting animated shorts last week at RESFEST 10's Screener Series: Singapore, whose inclusion would have given a better sense of the scope of work being done here. Or other works by the same filmmakers could have been included in this programme, to avoid duplication with RESFEST and other showcases.

Coming back to the Singapore Animation Showcase screening on Sunday, my friend remarked afterwards that the shorts appeared to be divided into two categories: those strong in story or those strong in the technical aspect of animation. Call it a left-brain/right-brain dichotomy, which meant that rare was the filmmaker who was adept at both and so the more collaborative works tended to fare better.

So here are another slew of awards I’d like to give out to the films at the Singapore Animated Showcase:

Most Befuddling
The Story of Black
Chung Cheng High
While somewhat derivative, I was quite impressed by the standard of the animation. Too bad the story didn’t make much sense.

Most Patriotic
Total Defence animations
CHIJ St Joseph
Some simple but effective animation in the service of the Total Defence campaign. Still, the faint whiff of propaganda lingered and I was soon longing for a shot of, say, Brian Gothong Tan’s We Live in a Dangerous World from the recently-concluded Singapore Biennale.

Strangest-looking Cupid Ever
Stupid Cupid
Dias Leong
Cupid looked like a thug in a sumo-wrestler get-up. Seriously.

Best Sound
Take to the Skies
Lim Beng Loon
A canny cashing-in on the fad for all things penguin, aided by a classic cartoon soundtrack.

Best in Show
The Pinnacle
Demonstrating that it’s possible to build suspense, hold audience interest and end things with a twist in a few short minutes. Nicely done.

Most Dangerously Titled
The Boaring Chase
The idea of a badly-designed (biologically speaking) alien held hostage by a boar tickled, but the chase around the world was clichéd.

Most Likely Inspired By The Phrase “If Pigs Could Fly”
Legend of the Pig
This riff on why pigs can’t fly stood out for its Chinese ink painting-like animation style. Charming in a low-key way.

Most Reminiscent of Teletubbies
Songs of Innocence and Experience
A cautionary tale about the power of words to hurt, let down by the déjà vu animation.

(For sinema.sg)

Little Shop of Horrors

Before their string of Disney hits came along, Alan Menken and Howard Ashman were best known for a raucous and rollicking musical called Little Shop of Horrors, the tale of a Faustian bargain with a horticultural twist. Meek and geeky Seymour Krelborn's fortunes take a dramatic turn for the better after he buys a mysterious plant that appears out of nowhere after an eclipse. Business booms at the flower shop he's working in and Seymour finds fame as a botanical genius. All he wants, though, is the girl, his co-worker Audrey. He even names the plant Audrey II after her. But in return for having his deepest desires fulfilled, Seymour will have to pay a price... Given the show's longevity, it's not uncommon for people to have watched more than one version of it, or even to have taken part in a school production. For me, Frank Oz's 1986 movie adaptation remains a favourite for its pitch-perfect casting. Rick Moranis' Seymour was nebbishy and yet had one rooting for him; Ellen Greene reprised the role of Audrey from the original off-Broadway production and was equally adept at milking laughs and eliciting sympathy; and Steve Martin was a revelation in his huge performance as Orin, Audrey's unhinged dentist boyfriend. In other words, comparisons are going to be inevitable.

So how do you stage a familiar and beloved musical and keep it fresh and exciting? Dream Academy's solution was to turn the trio of doo-wop back-up singers into a showcase for the Dim Sum Dollies. Mostly, it worked. Selena Tan, Pam Oei and Emma Yong zipped in and out of costumes and personalities and accents with such sass and pizzazz, they lit up the stage every time they appeared. They were SIA girls pulling trolley bags, Ah Lians spouting Singlish, car park makciks chattering in Malay, ladies who lunch oozing accented English, and nuns in habits for the heck of it. Unfortunately, the high-voltage energy of the Dim Sum Dollies segments altered the pacing and flow of the musical as the rest of the show failed to measure up to their standard. We were just waiting for the next appearance, and persona change, of the Dollies.

In retrospect, using the painted backdrop with the show's title and logo for several of the scenes was perfectly appropriate given that the entire musical was a backdrop for the Dim Sum Dollies. At the time though, it was a constant, annoying and unnecessary reminder that one was, in fact, watching Little Shop of Horrors. If different backdrops were out of the question, perhaps a generic Skid Row background would have worked as well.

It didn't help that director Glen Goei's staging felt rather static at points with the action concentrated on one or two spots downstage, including for Audrey's showstopper number Somewhere That's Green. He was more successful with the inspired and very funny finale which featured the entire cast in Audrey II costumes. If only there had been more of such moments...

The Dim Sum Dollies aside, the attempt to inject some Singaporean flavour into the musical had decidedly mixed results. The weak efforts to localise the American context (by substituting Lorong Skid Row for Skid Row, kaya toast for sliced bread etc.) soon wore out their welcome and even the laughter-on-cue from a vocal section of the audience dried up towards the end. The subtler lyrical tweakings, in Somewhere That's Green for example, worked better. "I cook like Betty Crocker and I look like Donna Reed" became "I cook like Violet Oon and I look like Zhang Ziyi." On second thoughts, it was Denise Tan's delivery that made it work. On his part, Tan Ju Meng managed to pull off a set that was a mix of Skid Row USA (walk-up stoops) and Joo Chiat (low-rise buildings, accented with under-construction green netting).

Denise Tan, as Audrey, was the clear standout among the cast. She struck the fine balance between camp and genuine emotion and brought it all home during her rendition of Somewhere That's Green. She made the part hers and more than held her own against the Dim Sum Dollies. Compared to Ellen Greene's brilliantly mannered vocal performance and more fragile Audrey, Tan gave an earthier interpretation while retaining the character's sense of vulnerability.
Dave "Electrico" Tan, aided by the puppeteers, brought Audrey II to life with a swaggering vocal performance spanning the gamut from pleading, cajoling plant to triumphant evil monster. Of course, credit has to go to Mascots and Puppets Specialists as well for constructing Audrey II, a mutant orchid with a disturbingly humongous chin that was either bulbous, or um, ballsy, depending on your point of view. A minor quibble: Audrey II's mouth movements were not always in sync with the vocals.

The rest of the cast didn't fare as well. Hossan Leong played, or rather underplayed, to type and his Seymour was not very engaging. This was a problem faced by Lim Yu Beng as well, whose turn as dentist Orin lacked the manic and maniacal over-the-top energy the part demanded. Sean Worrall, as Mushnik, the flower shop owner, seemed, for some reason, to be shouting most of his lines.

Ultimately, this Little Shop left me hungry, like Audrey II, for more... of the movie.

(For The Flying Inkpot)

RESFEST 10: Afterword

I arrived too early at Velvet Underground last night to find the near-equivalent of watching paint dry on the TV screens as contestants in the Icon Chef Design Competition tapped and clicked away on their laptops. Good thing there were drinks, courtesy of Smirnoff and Tiger, to lubricate the evening.

And so the winner of the first RESFEST Adobe Audience Choice Awards is … Momorobo for their video of Futon’s Strap It On. Maybe it’s just me, but I keep thinking of a Peach Robot every time I hear that name. But it’s not inappropriate given the strong Japanese influence in the video, even as Momorobo drew upon mythologies across different cultures to portray the various gods and deities.

The organisers also announced the winners of the Nokia Handheld Cinema competition, in which filmmakers had to use a video-equipped mobile phone to tell a story about “the unexplained, the inexplicable and the downright unbelievable.” SILNT’s Question Mark was a worthy winner. Questions, ranging from the mundane (Where’s my pencil?) to the metaphysical (What are we waiting for?) to the self-referential (Why are you here watching this?), flashed across the screen, framed by black and white images and a haunting soundtrack. It ended by questioning the idea that all questions had to have answers.
Second place went to Uncalled, an atmospheric piece about the suicide of a Filipino maid.
These pieces demonstrate that the technological barriers to filmmaking are lower than before. As long as you have an idea or a story, it is now much easier to bring it into fruition. What it does mean though is that good ideas will be more important than ever.

(For sinema.sg)

RESFEST 10
Screener Series: Singapore

It may sound strange to say this but I don’t have the attention span for shorts. Due to the constraints of the form, namely brevity, an impact has to be made quickly in order to draw the audience in. If it doesn’t do so right off the bat, my mind starts wandering.Also, works that are too short barely have time to register before they end — and then my brain blames me for the wasted burst of concentration and further shortens my attention span in revenge.
And there’s the fact that you seldom watch one short in isolation, so you’re constantly switching gears, trying to process what’s on screen and deciding whether you like it or not: yes, no, argh it’s over.
So 16 works in 66 minutes — including music videos, an instructional video, a video brochure, short films, short short films and “motion design” — was a rather daunting prospect. What did it take to leave a lasting impression and to distinguish oneself from the pack? A work with a distinctive voice or point of view that was assured and sustained.
Before the official Adobe Audience Choice Awards are announced tomorrow, I’d like to give out my own slew of awards.

Most Ambitious But Flawed
Take Me Home a.k.a. I Saw Jesus
Gözde and Russel Zehnder
A short film with some lovely images and a sustained elegiac tone. I wasn’t entirely sure what was happening, though the fact that it was puzzling was not necessarily a bad thing. What I found annoying was the aggressive soft focus, which didn’t let up for a single moment.

Most Open To Interesting Speculation
Strap It On — Futon
Momorobo
A manga-inspired battle between Futon and a band of otherworldly beings. Couldn’t quite make out what they were supposed to be strapping on.

Most Reminiscent Of Edward Gorey’s Gashlycrumb Tinies
Lacklustre Lucy
Damian Lee, Rex Lee

Most Likely To Be Mistaken For A Calvin Klein Ad
Beasty Beuys
Ivanho Harlim

Most Fun With Words, Literally
Olives — The Observatory
Ffurious

Best Dissection Of A Fairy Tale
How To Be An Effective Little Red Riding Hood
Pullat Anand Narayan

Best Visual Pun
Lost My Head — The Oddfellows
Eric Khoo
Ah, back to a more innocent time when avian flu wasn’t the threat it is today and chickens were free to roam and be slaughtered.

Most At Home In A Dance Club
Solskinn
Jogn
HDB flats look pretty when viewed through a kaleidoscope.

Best Hair
Passage
Thomas Barker

Least Likely To Induce A Headache/Most Creepy
Killing Time — The Observatory
Royston Tan
A simple single image of a person with headphones on is effectively turned into an unsettling, disturbing one when the eyeballs are whited out.

Most Bling
Blow — Parking Lot Pimp
Felix Ng

Best Cheesy Graphics, Best Deadpan Delivery, Best Lyrics
Beat Police
Beth Hunter
What’s not to like from the cheesy video game-like graphics to the concept of beat police hunting down those who massacre songs at karaoke lounges? If only they existed!

(For sinema.sg)

Eating Air
Kelvin Tong and Jasmine Ng

Year: 1999. Place: A darkened cinema hall, the smallest one in the cineplex.
Royston Tan is slouched down low in his seat. The movie begins and it’s a blast of electric guitars and drums. And Hokkien. Ah Boy is weaving through the CBD area, and in and out of the screen, on his motorcycle. The scene is a combination of close-ups, long shots and still frames. Tan is transfixed by the story of this group of young people, whose strongest bonds are of friendship and loyalty. The naturalistic dialogue, a rich rojak of Hokkien, Chinese, English, Malay, and the visual and aural inventiveness are a breath of fresh air. Yes, he thinks, why not a movie about gang members, a more realistic and gritty one that would plumb the depths of their loneliness. The girl though would have to go.
It’s not inconceivable.

Year: 1995. Place: Another darkened cinema hall, but still the smallest one in the cineplex.
Kelvin Tong is reviewing Eric Khoo’s Mee Pok Man. He is struck from the get-go by the frenetic opening sequence, the dark subject matter, and joy of joys, Chinese, Hokkien, English as it’s spoken in Singapore. Yes, this is what a Singapore film could be, one that reflected the loneliness of urban isolation and plunged fearlessly into the macabre and the morbid, and it was exhilarating to watch it unfold on the big screen. Yes, he thinks, why not a movie about another ignored and even despised segment of society - teenage delinquents. But perhaps a lighter tone, possibly with flights of fantasy, and a thumping soundtrack that reflected their world.
It’s not inconceivable.

Year: 2006. Place: National Museum of Singapore
You’re in the audience for cine.sg’s showcase of Singapore films, specifically, Eating Air. The movie came out several years ago but had disappeared all too quickly from local screens and you never got round to watching it. The story is about Ah Boy and his buddies, Ah Gu, Cao He Lang and Aw Tau. They hang out, at the arcade, at the void deck, riding their motorbikes, in a kind of timeless existence marked only by the summons of each other’s pages. Ah Boy then meets Ah Girl, though their tentative love story is upstaged by Ah Gu’s reckless behaviour and the dictates of loyalty.
There’s an exuberance to the film-making and you like the visual and aural inventiveness. Still, some of it seems to be showiness for its own sake. There’s also a problem with pacing and an uneven tone which makes the ending rather jarring.
The actors are good though. Benjamin Heng and Joseph Cheong are natural and charismatic, and Alvina Toh turns in a convincing performance as Ah Girl, despite the role being somewhat underwritten. Mark Lee and Michelle Chong score some laughs with their portrayals of Lau Beng and a Malaysian shop proprietress respectively, while Kit Chan pops up for a head-scratching cameo.
Yes, you think, this was a worthy effort. And maybe, the story that I have in my head is worth telling too.
It’s not inconceivable.

(For sinema.sg)

Breathe Me 呼吸
Sandy Lam 林忆莲
At last, her long-awaited follow-up to 2001’s excellent 原来…林忆莲. In a sense, this album can be seen as a companion piece to last year’s Cantonese release 本色, in which she returned to her dance roots.
The lead single was a cover of New Order’s Bizarre Love Triangle, which actually worked as a slice of Mando dance pop. It was easier to accept than expected perhaps because frente! already did a more radical reworking of the track. The cover of The Cardigans’ Communication however, sent me scurrying for Nina Persson’s haunting take on the ignored Long Gone Before Daylight album. And oh yeah, I’m not too thrilled that 4 of the tracks are covers.
The highlight of the album is undoubtedly the Peggy Hsu-penned 放开手, with its shifting rhythms and soaring chorus deftly handled by Sandy. Unfortunately, the return to her dance roots means we don’t get a stirring mid-tempo ballad that Sandy is so good at. The most obvious contender 相信 is let down by its dated production and also by the fact that it’s meant to be an obvious contender.
I’ll take a new release by Sandy any day but this one seems to have fallen short of her own high standards. Then again, her albums have always been growers, so maybe I’ll just reserve final judgement on this album for a while yet.

It turned out to be a gathering of old friends.
Yew Hong Chow, the harmonica player, was there and played a few tunes for us. For some reason, the harmonica’s mellifluous tones make me go all nostalgic in a way the recorder never could. And I wondered again how much cooler it would have been to learn to play the harmonica in school.
Victor Khoo was there though not Charlee since it was past his bedtime. It’s humbling to think how many generations of kids have grown up with Victor and Charlee and how much laughter and merriment they’ve brought to us.
The Teochew newsreader was there, soldiering on in Teochew, a guardian of the last bastion of dialect on radio.
Pin Pin’s uncle was there and he sportingly sang a stanza of an old Chinese song.
And of course, Tan Pin Pin herself. She had made the introductions in Singapore GaGa and now all of us, family, friends, well-wishers, were gathered for the official launch of the DVD.

Pin Pin tried gamely to deliver her comments in both English and Mandarin, but the latter proved just a tad too daunting. Still, what was clear in the movie again came shining through - Pin Pin’s genuine affection for the people in it and her gratitude to them for trusting her with their stories. And they in turn, thanked Pin Pin for giving them the chance to tell their stories. Tonight, this was Singapore, full of warm, fuzzy, gaga feelings.

The nostalgia–laden door gift was a stringed tin-can with a treasure trove of tidbits and toys from yesteryear.

(For sinema.sg)

The Prestige
Chris Nolan
A story of the poisonous rivalry between two magicians, Alfred Borden (Christian Bale) and Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman), after a trick that involves them both goes wrong and ends up killing Angier’s wife. It’s wrapped in an elaborate set-up, shifting from one’s point-of-view to the other as each one appears to have the upper hand. At the heart of the movie is the secret behind Borden’s act The Transported man.
The problem with the puzzle-movie however, is that having figured out the this mystery halfway through, thanks to the repetition of hints and some unusual camera choices, I was smugly satisfied and wondered why the movie was dragging on so. But Chris (director and co-writer) and Jonathan Nolan (co-writer) had more tricks up their sleeves. There was now Angier’s trick to figure out. But the fact that they tried to have their cake and eat it too rankled. If you bought their explanation, well and good, but if you didn’t, they had an admonishment ready, you, the viewer, are simply not ready or willing to accept the ‘truth.’ But the unsatisfying deus ex machina only left me feeling cheated.
Still, this was a handsomely-filmed movie, and Bale was as intensely charismatic as ever. Despite its flaws, this is a genre-busting movie that managed to linger on in my head.

Veronica Mars
Rob Thomas
When Buffy the Vampire Slayer ended its run, a gaping hole loomed on the tv landscape. Sure, Angel was still around, but he was no petite blonde kicking ass. Enter Veronica Mars, a high school girl trying to solve the mystery of her best friend’s death, and not missing a single comeback in the process. Salon.com anointed the show with The Buffy, for “the season’s most unjustly ignored TV show.” Veronica Mars’ status as the Chosen One was sealed with the cameo appearance of Joss Whedon in the second season (which also featured Buffy/Angel alumnus Charisma Carpenter).
While still enjoyable, the second season had a few mis-steps, including the too-Ghost Whisperer-y-for-comfort encounters with the victims of the school bus crash. There was even an episode or two in which the dialogue just felt off. You always take consistency of tone for granted, until it isn’t. I also didn’t appreciate the storylines which went nowhere, in particular, the relationship between Veronica’s dad and her best friend Wallace’s mom.
But all was forgiven with the third season’s Rob Thomas-penned premiere. Veronica is off to college and still doing what she does best. It’ll be interesting to see if there’ll be a central case overarching the entire season even as ripples of events past continue to be felt.

Freaks and Geeks
Paul Feig
Maps out the bittersweet terrain of adolescence with honesty, humour and warmth, marking out small moments of triumphs alongside bigger moments of sheer awkwardness and embarrassment. The setting is McKinley High in Michigan circa 1980. Lindsay Weir, ‘Mathlete,’ moves from the geek camp to the freak camp as she strikes up friendships with Daniel Desario (with his “bedroom eyes and ratty hair”), his girlfriend Kim Kelly, sarcastic Ken Miller and Nick Andopolis, who never quite gets over her after a short-lived relationship. She’s in the process of figuring out who she is and who she wants to be. Her younger brother Sam, together with his best friends Neil Schweiber and Bill Haverchuck are firmly in the geek camp, and have to deal with being picked upon by jocks and ignored by girls. But when Sam gets the girl of his dreams, it turns out to be nothing like what he expected.
Watching the episode ‘Kim Kelly Is My Friend’ was a rather odd experience. It featured the same characters but was meaner in toner and darker in spirit compared to the rest of the series. Could understand why it wasn’t shown when F&G aired.

Undeclared
Judd Apatow
Just about as short-lived as Freaks & Geeks, on which Apatow was the executive producer. It was essentially F&G go to college with many familiar faces popping up including Seth Rogen (who played Ken Miller; Rogen also pulled writing duties on Undeclared), Jason Segel (Nick Andopolis) and Samm Levine (Neil Schweiber).
Sweetly geeky Steve Karp is all set to experience college life with his suitemates, including ladies’ men Lloyd Hathe (British import Charlie Hunnam), Lizzie Exley (alas with an obsessive older boyfriend), Rachel Lindquist, sarcastic Ron Garner and oddball Marshall Nesbitt. Popping up more often than Steve would like is his recently divorced father (Loudon Wainwright III). The tone was decidedly more comic, with mayhem usually ensuing as the gang tangled with cheating on term papers, pledging, getting jobs and falling in and out of love.

Miami Vice
Michael Mann
Mann has updated it by immersing it in the hip-hop milieu and… that’s about it. Vice doesn’t work as mindless entertainment given the somewhat slow pacing. More devastatingly, it suffers from a lack of chemistry between Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx and between Farrell and Gong Li. Neither does it work as a serious-minded genre piece because it's too inane plot-wise. The Wire has spoilt me in this respect and it didn’t help that Domenick Lombardozzi from the series pops up in a supporting role here. Also, the dialogue was the pits, all stilted and unconvincing. Not since the Star War prequels has there been dialogue this unnatural.
Gong Li was the unexpected heart of the movie as a businesswoman who falls in love. Alas, she was not the focus of the movie.

Little Miss Sunshine
Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris
A dysfunctional family road-trip comedy (shades of Daytrippers) with an emphasis on the dysfunction. Motivational speaker (and creator of The 9 Steps) Richard Hoover fights with his wife Sheryl over money problems; his father is a rascally heroin junkie; her brother is a failed suicide attemptee; their son is obsessed with Nietzsche and has taken a vow of silence; and their precocious daughter wants to take part in the titular contest. The movie is carried by the strong ensemble cast and Carrell proves he can do drama as well as comedy. While the quirky characterisations raise some laughs, it’s the tiny truthful moments of familial interaction that resonate. A literal running sight gag involving the VW bus didn’t hurt either.
Have been creeped out by pageants for little girls after pictures of JonBenet Ramsey all dolled up and decked out were splashed all over the media. If you’re queasy about such events, the kicker of a finale in the movie should prove satisfying.

http://www.xfm.co.uk/

It used to be that which radio station you listened to was a function of geography. In Philly, I listened to WDRE, mourned its demise (a moment’s pause for the passing of Shriek of the Week),* then switched to Y100. But now it’s one more thing that the internet has changed. If your local radio stations suck, fear not, xfm is here. The playlist is geared towards indie pop/rock, with greater emphasis on the UK scene given that xfm is a London-based station. Which is perfect as far as I’m concerned.
Recently discovered their video jukebox which, for now, is free of the annoying ads foisted on one at uk.launch.yahoo.com.+ Current choice picks include Phoenix’s Consolation Prizes, The Knife’s Heartbeats and Editors' Bullets, in which they have the chutzpah to build a song around the lyric 'You don't need this disease/Not right now,' and the panache to pull it off. It does beg the question though as to when would be a good time. "Sir, would you like your disease now?" "Oh Jeeves, I don't think I could bear it right now." "Very well sir, perhaps after supper then." "Right-ho."
Just browsing through the A list turns up Aqualung, Antony and the Johnsons, Ash, Art Brut, Athlete. This is gonna be good. (See sample xfm commentary below.) Let's all be glad that geography need not be aural destiny.

*Writing this reminded me that I had made a recording of WDRE's final hours. Fished out the cassette and pressed play with anticipation. Which promptly got it stuck in the tape deck.
+Oh goody, just checked out Mr Timberlake's comeback single, Sexy Back, on the site and found that the annoying ads have vamoosed. For now.

Phoenix ‘Consolation Prizes’
Long before the likes of The Feeling and Orson came along, Phoenix were making ridiculously catchy pop rock in that way that only French musicians seem to and ‘Consolation Prizes’ taken from their new album ‘It’s Never Been Like That’ is another cracking single to soundtrack your summer to. Again, stop motion animation is the method of choice with the band hurtling round and popping up in various locations in their native Paris.

The Knife 'Heartbeats'
Looking like it was adapted from home video footage used up in a fruitless attempt to get a shot of two little boys colliding on skateboards. Blending looped footage of several of the little buggers skating along behind a car with raggedly animated birds in flight may be The Knife's way of making some kind of comment on human migration, or it may just be that the budget was fucked.

Editors 'Bullets'
The stadium filling swell of 'Bullets' - Editors' finest single to date - is set against shots of mildly depressing small town life and the band themselves looking stoically into the distance. Like a Gap ad directed by Mike Leigh.

Singapore Dreaming
Colin Goh, Wu Yen Yen
It better be a problem with the projection. It had to be. The film was out of focus for long stretches and took on a fish-eye lens effect that just strained the eyes. So this didn’t help.
Neither did the fact that most of the roles never developed into full-fledged characters. I expected more than caricatures rehashing old themes on the most superficial level. Instead, scattered pot-shots were aimed at the Loh family’s preoccupation with the 5C’s, academic pressure, paper qualifications, with nary a resounding hit. Forget about the Singapore dream, why was this their dream? Why did they want the things they want? Just kept thinking that the Talking Cock website had funnier and more insightful things to say on this, or any other, topic.
The movie’s laugh-out-loud scene was between CK (husband of Mei, the daughter) and a beer promoter from China. Language barriers are always a hoot. The scene even took an unexpected turn when the promoter reveals that she’s working in order to save up for her dream. (That’s the second time, after Homesick, that a character from China embraces Singapore as the land of opportunity. Hmm, how soon before this turns into a clichéd shorthand?)
Given the general disinterest in the characters, the movie ended up seeming overlong. Even the revelations of the long-suffering mother was too little too late.
Yeo Yann Yann stood out for her convincing portrayal of Mei, a woman who tries to do the right thing but has to battle with an inferiority complex and pressures from work and family. She wasn’t likeable but at least one could see where she was coming from.

Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers
Mary Roach
It only took 3 years. When it came out in 2003, Stiff was feted as one of the year’s best. Eventually bought it in New York after it came out in paperback, and then it sat on my shelf in Beijing, then Singapore, before I finally got round to it.
And what an immensely enjoyable read it was. A book that makes you think about the possibilities after you die doesn’t come along everyday. Roach displays a consistently light touch, displays excellent comic timing, and ferrets out the most appropriate similes, turning what could have been a grim and/or morbid subject matter into an entertaining and hilarious book. Armed with curiosity and a lack of squeamishness, she ventures into labs, freezers, compost, to turn up facts about death and cadavers that most of us have simply never concerned ourselves with. She also shares generously with us the absurdities of yore with regard to medical science as well as of various maverick individuals and their experiments. Should have picked it up sooner.

Mysterious Skin
Gregg Araki
This has to be the most restrained that Araki has ever been, and it’s a good thing. Araki stays pretty faithful to Scott Heim’s book, though the narrative is now focussed on Brian Lackey and Neil McCormick instead of being filtered through the various characters. It’s not easy evaluating film adaptations on their own merit because I keep thinking about the source material and looking out for what’s been changed or dropped. The pacing usually feels off because I prefer the more expansive pacing of the book. The pivotal final scene though was exquisitely directed and acted and proved to be even more moving than on the page.
Have to say that Joseph Gordon-Levitt did a great job as Neil, he’s definitely left 3rd Rock from the Sun behind. Quite a few familiar faces including Elisabeth Shue (what’s she been up to?), Michelle Trachtenberg (from Buffy) and Mary Lynn Rajskub (from 24) show up in the solid supporting cast.

The Sunday Philosophy Club
Alexander McCall Smith
Hoodwinked by the "international bestseller" label and the promise of a new series from the author of the highly successful The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency books. This one features 40-something Isabel Dalhousie, who edits the Review of Applied Ethics, and gets involved in what is strictly not her business when she witnesses the fall of a young man at a theatre in Edinburgh. Unfortunately, the murder mystery set-up was merely the most skeletal of frames for Smith to hang his various digressions into applied ethics and issues of morality. Uh-huh. Unfortunately, most of the digressions were just not very interesting. So don’t come a-knocking unless that’s what you’re a-wanting. Judging by the comments on amazon.co.uk, quite a few were similarly underwhelmed by this book.
No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, though episodic and difficult to get into, did at least offer the laidback charms of an unfamiliar setting, Botswana. It was also suffused with a genuine affection for the land and its people. But it didn't compel me to explore the rest of the series though.

When It’s All Over We Still Have to Clear Up
Snow Patrol
With the benefit of hindsight, I can’t help but conclude that the clutch of singles from ‘Final Straw’ was perhaps Snow Patrol’s finest hour. I remember hearing Run with its anthemic chorus ‘Light up/Light up/As if you had a choice,’ and they were right, I didn’t. This was followed by Spitting Games, Chocolate, How to be Dead, one melodic slice of indie-rock after another. Which is why ‘When It’s All Over’ is such a disappointment. There’s nothing particularly distinctive about it with too many tracks falling into a mid-tempo morass of indistinguishability. And why do so many songs start with the repetition of a lyric?
The lead single from their new album ‘Eyes Open’ flirted worryingly with generic arena-sized rock and follow-up single Chasing Cars sounds like more of the same.
Is this it?

The Human Body EP
The Electric Soft Parade
The White brothers have never been happy peppy campers and a quick glance at the titles, ‘Cold World,’ “Stupid Mistake,’ ‘Kick in the Teeth,’ indicates an exploration of familiar morose territory. But the lyrics suggest there’s something else going on. On ‘Cold World,’ ESP sings ‘I wanna get rid of this feeling/I want to be a part of everything’ and discover ‘at the centre of it all, a beating heart.’ The human body is a fragile thing, skin and teeth and muscles and heart; but it’s capable of love and violence and stupidity. ‘So Much Love’ suggests that we have a choice.
Music-wise, ESP has moved from the intimate indie-sound of “Holes in the Wall” and continues from the sonic explorations of “The American Adventure.” Thankfully, their ear for melody continues to be in evidence.
Looking forward to the next ESP release. Hopefully, it’ll be a full-length album.

Hard Candy
Hard candy is chat room parlance for an attractive minor. In this case, 14-year-old Hayley Stark, who hooks up with 32-year-old photographer Jeff Kohlver online. They meet, go to Jeff’s house and then Hayley turns the tables on Jeff. The premise was interesting but the movie could have been much tighter. Director David Slade, who had previously directed music videos, consistently goes in for close-ups to heighten the claustrophobia and ratchet up the tension. A better script would have helped.
Hard Candy’s realistic setting eventually raises troubling questions about Hayley and ultimately leaves little to choose between her and Jeff.
Ellen Page did well to portray a 14-year-old’s mix of bravado and vulnerability, though that eventually turns out to be an act. Patrick Wilson was smooth enough to keep us guessing and even win our sympathy through most of the movie.
Still, kept thinking all the time that Takashi Miike’s Audition was superior. The horror flick, with its surreal atmosphere, tapped into man’s primal distrust and fear of beautiful women and/or was a feminist revenge fantasy. And nothing in Hard Candy comes close to the excruciating act of vengeance inflicted in Audition.

Cherry
Matt Thorne
This was not something I would normally pick up since it looked like the male equivalent of chick lit. Which is what: Lad rag? Homme tome? Dude book?
But I was intrigued by the fact that it was longlisted for the Man Booker prize, and that Calvino, Schnitzler and Kafka were bandied about in one review.
As it turned out, I finished Cherry in 2 days. It was easy to read and Thorne had set up an intriguing premise which kept one engaged till the end. The protagonist, Steve Ellis, is a teacher who has had a long dry spell in the romance department. All this changes when a representative from Your Perfect Woman shows up on his doorstep and promises Steve his perfect woman. Steve eventually meets her and she is as he specified, down to the name ‘Cherry.’ Questions of who Cherry is and what Your Perfect Woman is exactly soon give way to darker questions of how far one is willing to go for love, or even the illusion of it.
Nothing is fully revealed beyond a tantalizing coda, which keeps the mystery lingering after the book ends.

Mysterious Skin
Scott Heim
Something happened during the summer when he was eight that has dogged Brian Lackey his entire life. After a Little League game, he found himself coming to in the crawlspace beneath his house with no memory of what occurred in the previous hours. He becomes convinced that he was the victim of an alien abduction, but as his repressed memories begin to surface, he realises that the key to unlocking the past lies with Neil McCormick, fellow Little-Leaguer turned hustler. As the story builds towards the meeting between the two, Heim paints a powerful picture of the effect of abuse and of the different coping mechanisms it triggers. He manages to keep a measured tone that never descends into shrillness or preachiness, letting the story speak for itself.
Heim also keeps things interesting with an evocation of small-town Kansas, and by filtering the narrative through a variety of characters.

A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian
Marina Lewycka
Reels you in from the get-go with a tantalisingly comic set-up of stubborn, love/lust-struck 84-year-old Nikolai Mayevskyj’s impending marriage to buxomy, gold-digging thirty-something Valentina from Ukraine. His estranged daughters, Nadezhda and Vera, soon team up to prevent this from taking place. The Mayevskyjs themselves are Ukrainian, but have settled down in the UK.
Having drawn one in, one is treated as a co-conspirator by Nadezhda, whose point of view grounds the novel. We share in her reminiscences of her mother, her outrage at her father’s behaviour and her need to learn about her family’s past. What begins as a comical story develops into something much more and eventually the long shadow of the atrocities of war and history, the resilience of the human spirit and the strong bonds of family are all revealed. In between, we get treated to a discourse on yes, a short history of tractors, translated from the Ukrainian.

The Campaign to Confer a Public Service Star on JBJ
What’s in a name? With a title such as ‘The Campaign to Confer a Public Service Star on JBJ,’ quite a bit. It was bound to raise certain expectations, and if the entire play turns out to be a mere sleight-of-hand, the audience is going to feel cheated. One could argue that this was the point, that the title and the expectations it engendered was really a comment about the power of certain words, about (real or imagined) boundaries and the preconceived notions an audience carries with it into a theater. But no one is going to enjoy being taken for a ride (unless it’s a superbly constructed one).

Part of the problem with the play was an indulgence in double-speak and nudge-nudge wink-wink. There were puns and allusions and dances-around-the-mulberry bush, and by the end of act one, I was left wondering if it was going to be all peep but no show. Tan Tarn How commented in the programme that ‘the craft of beating about the bush is part of the playwright’s arsenal too.’ Fair enough, but clearly, beating about the bush is not an easy craft to master.

So what was Wong gunning at exactly? She teases us with the prospect of a government conspiracy with regard to the JBJ campaign, tells us that what happens to David Lee (the student leader whose brainwave it was to mount the campaign) is not the result of one and then proceeds to present us with a conspiracy anyway. In X-files style, complete with clandestine meetings in a car park. At which point the play tipped dangerously close into the territory of farce.

Despite the murky whole, there were scenes that worked. In the first act, David Lee seeks to harness the power of the internet to rally people to his cause. Wong milks the mr brown episode (in which the on-line blogger is censured when his commentary is carried in a newspaper) for a number of laughs and even lampoons New Age hokey-ness in the process. Even the non-sequiturs were funny.

In the second act, Clara Tang, the bureaucrat “tasked to exercise damage control,” has a hilarious encounter with the Deputy Superintendent (DSP) of the police. This was where the political satirizing was sharpest. As the DSP put it, in the Old Singapore, things were clear since nothing was allowed. The problem with New Singapore and the loosening of constraints was the sudden abundance of grey areas. In the Old Singapore, a memorandum from the “powers that be” would have made clear what was to be done in the matter of David Lee’s case. In the New Singapore, one was not given instructions and yet could not run afoul of the powers that be since constraints, albeit loosened, were still in place. It was enough to make one curl up, hide under one’s desk and suck one’s thumb! This was an over-the-top moment that illustrated perfectly the maddening frustrations of negotiating this New Singapore for the bureaucrat (at heart).

Unfortunately, there were also the dud scenes to sit through. Was there really a need to parody the Singapore Idol auditions? It was a too-easy target (the singing! the judges!) without much of a pay-off.

The bifurcated structure of the play, with its focus on David Lee in the first act and Clara Tang in the second, meant that both actors had to take on a number of roles. Oei’s comic timing and excellent use of accents were most welcome, though the less sympathetic Clara proved to be a harder nut to crack. In contrast, Oliveiro’s David came off as rather bland, and he never seemed to fully inhabit the different roles.

Staging-wise, Heng kept things simple and a few props often successfully conveyed entire settings. However, there were a couple of questionable choices. The video projection was unnecessarily stating the obvious (eg. transition into evening) and served to detract from the play. It was also a strange decision to have Oei announcing the act and scene number, which constantly took the audience out of the play.

So the sum of the uneven parts did not coalesce into a coherent whole. The ending, a dance between David and Clara, is meant to evoke… what exactly? Are they “dancing on graves” as Clara mentioned? What died? The passing of Old Singapore? Clara’s loss of innocence? Was this meant to be a poignant moment between the two? If so, it was not earned, and the play ended, not inappropriately, on an odd, neither-here-nor-there moment.

(For The Flying Inkpot http://inkpot.com/theatre/06reviews/0812,campconfpublserv,bc.html)

No Day Off
Eric Khoo

“No Day Off charts four years in the life of Siti, a young woman who leaves her husband and baby boy in a remote village in Sulawesi to work as a maid in Singapore. The narrative unfolds through her perspective and captures her trials and tribulations as she works for three different families in Singapore.”

This should be compulsory viewing for all prospective maid-owners (such a possessive term!). You hire a gardener, you go to the doctor’s, but you own a maid, with all the unpleasant connotations of slavery that implies. Of human bondage huh? The scary thing is that this view of maids isn’t far off the mark for some people. How else to explain the abuses, physical, verbal and mental, that take place?
These are people driven by economic necessity to seek a better life for their families and themselves by working overseas. Didn’t our ancestors do the same? Where is our sense of empathy? If not basic human courtesy?
The movie is told from Siti’s point of view and we don’t see the faces of the different families. All the better, says co-writer Wong Kim Hoh, for the audience to ask whether I’m the bastard up there on the screen.

Homesick

The title Homesick refers to different things: a longing for home, and literally, being sick at home as the play is set in the SARS crisis of 2003. This suggests an exploration of the tension between two opposing impulses: longing for home, and being sick in/of it. Playwright Alfian Sa'at explores this and more. He proceeds to unpack this central dilemma with nine characters (including the absent paterfamilias) over ten days, the period of home quarantine imposed upon the Koh family.
The plot, briefly: the somewhat estranged Koh family gathers in Singapore from all corners of the world when the patriarch falls ill. When he is diagnosed as a suspected SARS case, the entire family is slapped with a home quarantine order. They are joined unexpectedly by a young woman whose appearance injects more secrets and lies into the already volatile mix. Over the course of the play, we get to learn about each character's history as secrets are unearthed and lies exposed.
This is an ambitious undertaking in both the scope of the story and the breadth of the issues covered. Homesick is really two plays, a family (melo)drama and a play of ideas about identity and belonging. It is to Alfian's credit that it feels like a largely coherent and convincing whole. One wishes, however, that there was more space for some of the ideas and themes to breathe, such as the prickly issue of racial prejudices which the mixed marriage between Marianne (sibling number two of five) and Manoj had stirred up.
The exploration of family dynamics and sibling rivalry was adroitly handled and had the ring of emotional truth. When Ma pulls out a secret photo album, Arthur realises that he was never the neglected middle child he had believed himself to be. Such moments of familial interaction and poignancy served to ground even the most potentially shrill and one-note characters, keeping them human and believable.
Kudos as well to director Jonathan Lim for his deft and unobtrusive direction. Given that the play clocked in at two and a half hours, pacing was of the utmost importance. Lim and the untiring ensemble cast kept the momentum going through each and every day of the ten-day quarantine. While all the actors pulled off the neat trick of standing out as individual characters and also coming together as a family/cast, Remesh Panicker's low-key affability and Neo Swee Lin's sweet matriarch with a spine of steel were particularly effective. There were also moments of visual wit, as when the entire family is wearing surgical masks at the dining table, with Ma urging the unmasked Cindy (the young woman who had arrived unexpectedly) to eat.
Interestingly enough, the most disturbing point in the play came from offstage - from the audience's reaction. When Daphne voices her frustration, saying that she does not want to live out one man's dream since doing so leaves no room for her own, and then proceeds to identify this man as Lee Kuan Yew, there was a collective intake of the audience's breath. It was as if the spectre of the bogeyman had been raised. How and when did our founding father turn into he-who-must-not-be-named, or more specifically, he-on-whom-aspersion-shall-not-be-cast? As a pointed comment on freedom of expression and OB markers (real or imagined), this was a moment that spoke volumes.
This scene attracted the most attention during the feedback session after the play, with attendant questions about censorship. While the MDA's approval of the play suggests a loosening up over freedom of expression in theatre, what was even more heartening was Alfian's response that he was not practising self-censorship. If anything, the reverse was true and he was pushing the envelope instead. Alfian added cheekily that the censoring should be left to the authorities; after all, they are the ones who get paid for it.
Alfian also claimed during the session that he was not into grandstanding and that he was more concerned with the integrity and credibility of the characters. Still, one cannot deny the baiting power of statements such as "Singapore is not a country" or that Singaporeans do not exist. This was soapbox rhetoric that was meant to provoke a reaction. But he was also scrupulous enough to provide multiple viewpoints on any one issue which he handled with aplomb by juggling the interactions of the various characters.
This was aided by the set design, which was essentially the interior of the Koh family house. The living room, kitchen and dining area, and bedrooms served to physically segregate the characters so that crucial exchanges could take place between two or three characters while major confrontations involving the entire cast played out downstage. For example, youngest son Patrick's struggle with his looming National Service commitment is examined from different angles, and in different spaces, in his separate interactions with his brother-in-law Manoj and newcomer Cindy.
Over the course of the play, the characters wrestle with so many fundamental questions: "Who am I?" "If my mother is Peranakan and my father speaks Hokkien, how does speaking Mandarin connect me to my roots?" "Where is home?" "What are my familial obligations?" "Should I stay or should I go?" Not every question is resolved, but the asking and debating is important. If we cannot define ourselves by answers, asking questions is at least a start.
As I think about the play, more questions loom. What does it say that the character who most strongly embraces Singapore and sees it as the land of opportunity is not from Singapore? What about those for whom staying or leaving is not a choice? How much say do we have in the construction of a national identity?
This was a most auspicious beginning to the inaugural Singapore Theatre Festival. It bodes well for the rest of the festival, for the continued existence of the festival, and, most importantly, for theatre to play a vibrant and pertinent role in Singapore.

(For The Flying Inkpot http://inkpot.com/theatre/06reviews/0802,home,bc.html)

fun@library
went by toa payoh library this afternoon and was searching for 'a short history of ukrainian tractors' under SHO. even though it should be under LEW for author, was thinking, hey, u never know. while the ukrainian tractors were sadly elusive, i did find A S Byatt's A Whistling Woman mysteriously labelled SHI. decided to do the civic duty thing. after all,
a book mis-shelved is a book lost. hailed a jc student volunteer who
seemed shocked out of her wits to be approached. she was also unable to grasp the concept of 'mis-labelled.' 'just put it in one of those collection boxes to be shelved.' finally took the book to the enquiries counter on the ground floor. incredibly enough, the concept of 'mis-labelling' also appeared to elude the woman there. 'sometimes books are not labelled by authors' names,' was her first line of defence. 'huh, how are they labelled then?' she then called up the book's entry on the computer system and triumphantly announced that the author was leonora shields. except that it clearly wasn't. unless A S Byatt in large font on the front of a book was some fancy new typographic design. by this point, decided that what constituted 'authorship' was too
convoluted to go into and that i should leave the nlb to its own devices.

Twelve Stops and Home by The Feeling
Already I’m wondering how long this love affair can last. But for now, The Feeling’s debut album is the perfect summer fling. Singles ‘Sewn’ and ‘Fill My Little World’ are typically swoonsome offerings from the band, with uncomplicated and direct lyrics about love and desire set to sunny tunes. Sample lyric: I want you now/I don’t care how/We’re both too young/To be sitting around
Ah youth!
The hidden track ‘Miss You’ slows things down and ends things on an elegiac and bittersweet note. Lovely.

Cars
Maybe it was the setting, a car race in which to the victor goes the spoils of endorsement deals, a movie career and of course, female cars. Maybe it was the well-worn story that lacked Pixar’s customary heart. Maybe it was just inevitable.
The fact remained that Cars didn’t quite live up to expectations. Sure, those were high expectations but Pixar had been successively knocking them out of the park since Toy Story. The animation was great but Pixar have forgotten their own mantra that “the story is king.” Cars’ plot, a minor retread of the mentor-protégé relationship, misses the royal mark this time. Suddenly, every character seemed like a stereotype from the goofy sidekick to the spunky gal.
Still, it wasn’t all bad and the last act mustered up some excitement and heart, but it was not nearly enough. The taint of commercialism lingered still. Here’s hoping for a return to form with Ratatouille.

A Stranger At Home
A mish-mash of several plays by Quah Sy Ren as well as essays co-written with Ng How Wee. Alas, what might work better on the page does not translate well to the stage. A couple of interesting points were made. For example, the fact that Singaporeans had no sense of the past, literally, since old buildings were constantly being torn down to make way for new ones. Even the dead were not spared this constant redevelopment and had to be exhumed as well. Or the ironic story of how Hokkien, driven to extinction by officialdom, turned out to be the sole language of communication between a professor and a Malay cleaning woman. However, these were buried deep within an overly self-indulgent whole. The entire Ying Ru-Joan-Tim triangle served only to grate while the Wu Yue story, narrated in Hokkien with patchy surtitles, further tested one’s patience. The music and projected visuals often seemed unnecessary and ended up distracting one’s attention.

15

Royston Tan’s unflinching portrait of lost youths: cutting classes, getting into bloody fights, taking drugs, smuggling drugs, prostituting themselves. Tan doesn’t judge but invites us into their world. This is their Singapore, one in which the Merlion spews forth an endless stream of bile and the merits of architecture are based on the criterion of suitability for suicide.

Despite the sombre subject matter, the film’s aural and visual inventiveness relieves some of the oppressiveness. The secret society chants set to techno beats kick gangsta rap’s ass. Good thing there were subtitles though or I would have been totally lost. In a scene on a bus, Tan presents us with a visual metaphor for the boys’ emotional state. You realise, after a while, that the scene is unfolding in rewind mode, but forwards, backwards, there’s little discernible difference. That’s how trapped they feel.

There seems to be a lot of crying for a film about gangsters, and then it hits you that these kids are just 15. It’s not quite clear how they ended up on such a desperate path, though broken families and familial violence are referred to. These kids feel so hopeless and alone that they cling onto each other with a fierce desperation. Before they were ostracised because of their tattoos and piercings, were they already marginalised because of their family backgrounds, which were broken, violent and drenched in verbal abuse? Can anything be done for them? The bleak end titles suggest not.

Cut
Royston Tan’s screw-you to the Board of Censors, done with wit and humour, song and dance. When a member of the board is discovered shopping in a supermarket, a zealous ‘fan’ tails her, admiringly reciting the number of cuts made in films past, including The Hours (‘Will watching two women kiss turn me into a lesbian?’), City of God, Y Tu Mama Tambien (in which the pivotal ending was cursorily excised). And of course, the 27 cuts made to Tan’s 15. The 'fan' enthuses over the edgy, jump-cut cinematic style 'championed' by the board and how it proved its ‘ingenuity’ in editing Chicago’s musical numbers. The short then goes into full-blown musical mode with cameo appearances from fellow sympathisers in film, theatre and tv. In 12 succinct minutes, Tan takes aim and lets fly one satisfying zinger after another.

Death and the Ploughman
The demise of his beloved wife fuels the ploughman with such a deep rage and grief that he questions Death, demanding justice for the wrong that has been done. Death, dapper and polite, stands in stark contrast to the emotional ploughman but is eventually shaken by the latter’s persistence and rejection of death’s reasonableness. The deus ex machina proclaims honour to the ploughman and victory to Death.
Death and the Ploughman was written in the context of the death of the author’s wife and after the Black Death had exacted a heavy toll on Europe. It is both a personal cry of anguish and a questioning of man’s place in the larger scheme of things.
As the translator Michael West acknowledges, “it is not, strictly speaking, a play.” Staging it proves to be a daunting challenge. The choreographed movements of the actors prevent the drama from lapsing into stasis but prove to be distracting at times. The decision not to have an interval was the right one but it did not make the heavy-going play any easier to absorb. The arguments made are not exactly new to us but provide an illuminating look at one man’s struggle with faith and life and death at the turn of the 15th century.

Fundamental by Pet Shop Boys
Widely acclaimed as PSB’s return to form circa ‘Very.’ However, lead single ‘I’m With Stupid,’ despite its deliciously cutting lyrics on the Blair-Bush relationship, can’t measure up to ‘Can You Forgive Her.’ The highlight is instead ‘The Sodom and Gomorrah Show.’ The OTT-ness and religious imagery bring to mind ‘It’s A Sin’ but it’s its own beast. ‘Do you want to go to the Sodom and Gomorrah show?’ Hell yeah!
Elsewhere, the Boys explore a darker synth-pop sound to go with the doom and gloom of the sometimes clunky lyrics. And yet, somewhat surprisingly, all this moroseness has inspired the Boys to come up with their strongest set of tunes in a while. So if comparing “Fundamental’ to ‘Very’ is premature, it’s nevertheless an indication of its strength that comparisons are being made in the first place.
The design for the 2-CD limited edition boasts an all-black CD jewel case (to complement my all-white CD case of Faye Wong’s Ridiculous Thoughts) housing a lyric booklet in glossy black, all the better to set off the neon-light design of the song titles. The bonus disc ‘Fundamentalism’ comes with remixes and two new tracks ‘Fugitive’ and ‘In Private,’ which features Elton John. ‘Fugitive’ would have fit right in on ‘Fundamental,’ while ‘In Private’ is an anthemic stomper.

Fisherman’s Woman by Emiliana Torrini
Folksy Italian-Icelandic chanteuse, morphed from earlier incarnation as cool queen of chill on ‘Love in the Time of Science.’ Not like Bjork. At any rate, why does hailing from the same region necessitate a comparison between artistes? Is geography destiny in music?
Highlights are ‘Sunny Road’ and ‘Heartstopper.’ The unusual mix of the tales of a defiant and unrepentant protagonist with lovely melodies and delicate vocals works nicely. Torrini grounds her stories with a slice-of-life ordinariness that makes them more compelling. On ‘Sunny Road,’ she sings that she’s ‘running out of space/n here’s my address and number/just in case.’

It’s Never Been Like That by Phoenix
What is plain from the get-go of the title and album opener “Napoleon Says,’ is that Phoenix are reinventing themselves on their third album. Out goes the laidback, unflappable cool groove of ‘Alphabetical’ that they perfected over two albums and in come the guitars and the drums. Their Frenchness seems more pronounced in the odd lyrical phrasing or did I just not notice this before? I miss the Phoenix of old, but it’s nice to see them striking out in a new direction. They’ve shaken things up to deliver a consistently listenable album of toe-tapping guitar pop and it seems churlish to cling onto the past. For those seeking an easier transition, head for ‘Long Distance Call’ and ‘One Time Too Many’ first.

Veneer by Jose Gonzalez
Veneer has been a surprise top ten fixture in the UK largely on the strength of ‘Heartbeats,’ an inspired cover of The Knife’s electro-punk original. It was accompanied by a whimsical and irresistible video of tens of thousands of coloured rubber balls bouncing through the streets of San Francisco, which was also the TV ad for Sony’s Bravia television sets.
So what about the rest of the album? Gonzalez doesn’t veer far from the territory staked out by Heartbeats, acoustic guitar folk-pop paired with intimate vocals. The first half of the album works better, including the grower of an opener ‘Slow Moves’ and the OC-approved ‘Crosses.’ Unfortunately, the latter half of the album melds into one undistinguishable whole. Still, most of the songs clock in at under 3 minutes, which has the canny effect of leaving you wanting more on the tracks you like and not vexing one too much otherwise.
As the man himself sings ‘my moves are slow, but soon they’ll know.’

Paradise Now tells the story of two suicide bombers Said and Khaled. Yes, the movie humanizes the terrorists but it does not condone the act of terrorism.
Does it answer the question of why suicide bombers do what they do? We learn that it was mild-mannered sombre-faced Said who had convinced Khaled, concluding that living in occupied land, they were as good as dead anyway. Khaled seemed to be playing at being a terrorist, and this came across most strongly as he was taping his farewell message. Said, however, has another, more personal reason, redemption. Though that too, is rooted in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Suha, with whom Said shares a budding mutual attraction, offers a moderate alternative, arguing that the suicide bombings only give the Israelis a reason to strike back. Khaled responds that there is no guarantee that the Israelis will stop if the bombings cease, but he is eventually persuaded by Suha and tries, in vain, to stop Said from his mission.
Director and co-scriptwriter Hany Abu-Assad has presented both sides of the argument for and against terrorism and leaves us with two characters who choose opposing paths. He also finds moments of humour and absurdity, which all wars generate. Still, the movie is firmly rooted in a Palestinian point of view, and the gleaming images of Tel Aviv at the end present a stark contrast to how and where the Palestinians live their lives.
The final image we are left with is Said’s eyes - haunted and haunting, as he sits in a crowded bus full of Israelis.
Would Said’s suicide bombing radicalise Khaled? Would Khaled remain convinced that there were non-violent means with which to achieve freedom?
There are no easy answers. But without an attempt to break the cycle, the circle of violence can only continue.

A, E and K had earlier flights so set off for st peter’s on my own. encountered school groups with banners on the way there and wondered if it was some kind of demonstration. turned out to be a mass dance in st peter’s square organized by a radio station. the kids wore yellow caps and had yellow and white streamers while bunches of yellow and white balloons dotted the crowd. there were exhortations of ‘long live the pope,’ ‘wave your caps’ and ‘with vigour!’ (forza!) was surprised when the music that came on was set to a thumping beat and featured the word ‘cioccolate’ prominently in the chorus.


decided to enter the basilica. managed to join the line for ‘cupola,’ thinking it was the cappella. ended up paying €4 to climb yet another 320 steps, which led into the dome of the basilica. could smell the incense and hear the choir as mass was being celebrated. onward and upward until i emerged from the dome for a great view of st peter’s square. left before the pope made his usual appearance at noon from the window of his living quarters.


asked the front desk about a shuttle service to fiumicino airport as i had seen an ad for a €26 service. was offered a €50 limousine service, so the metro it was. quite glad i didn’t end up buying the volumes on Italian art as i lugged the backpack about.
while the food on KLM was fine, the thought that they’ll be serving it again on the next flight (from amsterdam to singapore) was less than appetising. too bad if you don’t like cold pasta or cream cheese spread with onions and herbs.

ok, that was just the short-haul flight snack box talking.