Film Picks: Singapore International Film Festival, Singapore Writers Festival, Animation Nation

Singapore International Film Festival

Making its Singapore premiere is Arnold Is A Model Student (PG13, 85 minutes, two screenings, at separate locations and timings), a satirical comedy about the chaotic state of the Thai school system.

It is from Thai film-maker Sorayos Prapapan, whose short films have screened at previous editions of the Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF). One of them, the comedy Death Of The Sound Man, picked up the Best Director (South-east Asian Short Film) prize at the 2017 SGIFF and is available on streaming sites such as Vimeo.

Arnold Is A Model Student, Sorayos’ first feature, was selected for the Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland and has just won the New Talent Award at the Hong Kong Asian Film Festival. The festival called it “a growing-up story of a model student which develops into a critique of the repressive and corrupt education system in Thailand. It strikes a perfect balance between outrage and irreverence”.

There will be a question-and-answer session with the film-maker after the Dec 3, 4pm, screening at Golden Village Plaza.

Where: Various locations including Filmgarde Kallang, Kallang Leisure Park, 5 Stadium Walk; and Golden Village Plaza, Plaza Singapura, 68 Orchard Road
MRT: Nicoll Highway/Dhoby Ghaut
When: Nov 24 to Dec 4, various timings
Admission: From $15, with concessions
Info:

sgiff.com

Animation Nation

Since 2004, this animation festival, organised by the Singapore Film Society, has featured award-winning works as well as talks and classes led by international professionals.

The Singapore Showcase section, held at the ArtScience Museum, is free on a first-come, first-served basis.

The screenings, to be held on Monday and Tuesday, include the short films Rain and Daisies And Sparrows – both directed by Ervin Han, co-founder of local animation studio Robot Playground Media. According to the festival brochure, the two works are among the seven from the studio to be given a retrospective and showcase the label’s desire to “contemplate notions of home, place, and identity”.

Han will be present at a question-and-answer session after the Tuesday screening at 4.30pm. For this event, admission is free with registration at the festival website.

Where: Golden Village Suntec City, 3 Temasek Boulevard; ArtScience Cinema, Level 4 ArtScience Museum, 6 Bayfront Avenue; and Lasalle College of the Arts, 1 McNally Street
MRT: Promenade/Bayfront/Rochor
When: Till Wednesday, various timings
Admission: From $15, with discounts for Singapore Film Society Friends and Fam and Golden Village Movie Club members
Info:

str.sg/w9Gn

Singapore Writers Festival 2022: Print To Screen

Presented in partnership with the Singapore Writers Festival and with the support of the Embassy of France in Singapore and Institut Francais, the event showcases works adapted from literary sources.

In the 2019 drama Our Lady Of The Nile (PG13, 93 minutes, screens Sunday, 2.30pm), the exclusive Catholic boarding school of the film’s title is home to the daughters of Rwanda’s upper classes. It is the 1970s and ethnic tensions are building between the Hutu majority and Tutsi minority and soon, the hate speech seeps into the school.

The film is directed by French-Afghan film-maker Atiq Rahimi and adapted from Rwandan-born writer Scholastique Mukasonga’s 2012 novel of the same name, which covers the early days of a conflict that, by the 1990s, would become a genocide.

Where: The Projector, Level 5 Golden Mile Tower, 6001 Beach Road
MRT: Nicoll Highway
When: Till Sunday, various timings
Admission: $11.50, with concessions
Info:

str.sg/w9GB