An interesting article by Erika Franklin, "The Jaywalkers: Filmmaking Singaporean Style," in
Firecracker -- a recently-launched online magazine specializing in East Asian cinema -- profiles the new wave of independent filmmakers coming out of Singapore. Among these is Royston Tan, whose film
15 played this past weekend at the
Mix Festival in NY prior to a theatrical run, via
Picture This!, at
Anthology Film Archives.
As Ziad Semaan writes in his review of Royston's film in the same issue of Firecracker 3: "The
notoriously controversial 15 has finally broken out of its native Singapore and into the eyes of the rest of the world. Royston Tan's nihilistic attitude towards the traditions of both his country and the filmmaking process within have attracted more attention to the film than it probably deserves -- although how can one turn down an invitation to view a film considered 'a threat to national security' by the Singaporean censorship board?
"Tan's exploration of the alienated and disturbing lives of five fifteen year-olds on the glossy streets of Singapore's metropolis provides a chilling insight into the degradation of overlooked fringes in a wealthy Westernized society. Abandoned by disintegrating value-systems, such as their schools and families, the boys drift through an aimless routine of skipping school, dealing drugs, indulging in tattoos and piercings, not to mention other ills of consumer-focused societies...
"Tan's use of real life street kids who reinterpret his vision from their eerily similar lives certainly drives home the point, but more provocative than the violence, bad language and drug use (of which the films of Larry Clark have portrayed more extremely) is Tan's heavily stylized and unconventional style. His fast-paced slicing of the film is muddled with MTV chapter titles and scenarios depicted in true video game aesthetics. But, simultaneously, Tan presents the friendship and comraderie of these gang members in some patient sequences with stunning, if sometimes inconsistent, cinematography. Tan uses the cut with skill and precision -- sometimes to present the apathy and emptiness of these boys' lives, while other times extending their suffering, editing repeated shots into extended sequences (such as boys cutting themselves or the torturous drug-trafficking)."
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posted by Steve Gallagher @ 4/15/2005 10:51:00 AM
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