Making sense of the Malaysian Chinese experience
Recent circumstances, especially constant questions from my comrades from China, had caused me to evaluate my place as a Malaysian Chinese.
Posts
REUNION 我們都是這樣長大的 (1986), a Taiwanese film that haunted my memories since I was 12
When I was 12, I caught a film on TV. The film follows the lives of a group of elementary school students and their teacher. I was initially interested because the children were my age, and the teacher in the film was dedicated, like the teacher I was having then, Teacher Thor (that's her family name, yeah, but we all call her "Tu Lao Shi", which means Teacher Thor in Chinese). But I was slightly surprised when there were a few time skips in the film. The children suddenly became teenagers, and there was a class reunion with their teacher (that led to tragedy). They then became adults, and had another reunion, this time for a wedding. I remember that one of the main boys was in love with the bride. I didn't exactly finish the film, but a few of these scenes remained vivid until this very day (the teacher's fiancee sacrificing himself to save a drowning student during one of the class reunions, and also the aforementioned wedding). Perhaps the film was
RIVER OF EXPLODING DURIANS postproduction adventures
No, the process of postproduction, so far, had not been an adventure. But it's been a week since I came back to Tokyo, just so I could work on this film with utmost concentration, and solitude.
Turning 30
So, I turned 30 yesterday. A while ago, I looked at it with slight trepidation, I don't think I was prepared to say goodbye to my twenties just like that.
The final days of the RIVER OF EXPLODING DURIANS shoot (Cameron Highlands, protesters etc.)
Today's the last day of my twenties. I'm just doing what I like best, going through the post-production of my film, RIVER OF EXPLODING DURIANS. So, while I have to wait patiently for the tedious process of syncing the audio and video before I start editing, I'm just going to revisit the final days of the shoot.
Shooting RIVER OF EXPLODING DURIANS at the 140-year-old annual Johor Parade of the Gods
On February 20th, my RIVER OF EXPLODING DURIANS team and I headed off to Johor to shoot our ending. The reason why we were willing to endure a 4+ hour trip was because we wanted to catch the annual Johor "Parade of the Gods", a Chingay Parade that has been going for more than 140 years.