Featuring
a carefully curated selection of 26 films in the world canon, the O.PE.N. is
both a great standalone event and an excellent preamble to the 4th
edition of the Singapore International Festival of Arts, the last iteration
under the leadership of thespian trailblazer, Ong Keng Sen.
Indeed,
amongst a lineup where almost every single presentation is singularly great on
its own, it’s hard to choose just which films one should partake in—O.P.E.N.
film curator Tan Bee Thiam himself mentioned in our interview with him that “…The unique thing
about the O.P.E.N. films is that they’re all Singapore premieres. They do not
overlap. They run for two weeks one after another, almost as if you’re watching
a very long film or film series.”
For
those of you who do not have the luxury of time to watch all these films, we
here at SINdie pick for you 5 films and 2 short films that may not be the most well
known, but are definitely amongst those most interesting.
For more information on ticketing for the O.P.E.N: https://www.sifa.sg/theopen/ticketing/
1.
Fucking Bunnies
1
July / 5.30 pm / 17 mins / The Projector
Raimo
is a middle-aged man content with his life in the suburbs in Helsinki, Finland.
He plays squash, he greets the black steward at the gym in Swahili, and he is fine
with the status quo of incidental tolerance…until the leader of a Satanic Sex
Cult, Maki, moves his family in next door. What follows next is genuinely and
morbidly hilarious as Maki offers to be Raimo’s squash partner and slowly
intertwines lives to Raimo’s most conventional horror.
Premiering
in Sundance Film Festival’s Midnight Shorts segment, Finnish commercial
director Teemu Niukkanen’s debut fictional short film is at once a cunningly
intelligent social commentary and a dark comedy with a surprising abundance of
heart. A self-professed ‘master of lame’, Niukkanen explores the clash between the
mundane and the plain out weird with evident relish, and created a work that
artfully straddles the fine line between entertainment and social satire.
There
is a pre-screening talk by director Teemu Niukkanen and writer Antti
Toivonen.
2.
Spiral Jetty
7
July / 7.30 pm / 16 mins / The Projector

An
author hires a young archivist to whitewash her psychotherapist father’s
controversial legacy in this experimental drama.
Redolent
of the fictions of noted New York journalist Renata Adler in its fragmentary
presentation and depiction of a certain rarefied intellectual poverty, Spiral
Jetty is a collage of near-perfect imitations of think-pieces from reputable
journals spliced in with scenes of pastoral calm as we trace the progress of a
young archivist going through the materials that forms the public memory of a
brilliant if troubled psychologist. Director Ricky D’Ambrose displays an
erudite consideration and a measured sense of composition in this mostly still,
but subtly hypnotic work that would work just as well as an installation.
3.
Railway Sleepers
8
July / 5.30 pm / 102 mins / The Projector

A
documentary that spans the entirety of a 2-days 2-nights trip from Northen
Thailand to Southern Thailand, Railway Sleepers is a quiet meditation on the
relationship shared between the Thai and trains through the ages, and the
microcosms that blossom in every train ride.
The
debut work of Sompot Chidgasornpongse,
an assistant to Thai auteur Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Railway Sleepers is a
work eight years in the making, as the
director struggled to find a focus, and eventually decided not to, in a
meandering and pensive observation of railroad culture in contemporary Thai
society.
There is a post-screening dialogue session
with director Sompot Chidgasornpongse.
4.
Sunday Beauty Queen
9
July / 3 pm / 95 mins / The Projector

The
work of seasoned documentarian Baby Ruth Villarama, Sunday Beauty Queen traces
the lives and paths of five different Filipino domestic workers based in Hong
Kong over a period of four years as they toiled to live their fantasies for a
day in a beauty pageant.
An
exploration of the trials and tribulations of these foreign workers, the
documentary offers a warm and intimate insight into these invisible pillars of
society, thought it does shy into maudlin territories at times.
5.
The Challenge
9
July / 5.30 pm / 69 mins / The Projector
A
look into the significance of falconry in the development of the Arab
masculinity underscored by an observation of the lives of wealthy Qatari
sheikhs, The Challenge is a visually resplendent gaze into decadence and ennui
made poignant by a sparse and coolly distant soundscape.
6.
Harmonium
13
July / 7.30 pm / 118 mins / The Projector

The
winner of the Un Certain Regard Jury Prize in Cannes in 2016, Harmonium
documents a gradual breakdown of family with a bleak sensibility as the lives
of Toshio and his wife and daughter are disrupted by the emergence of Toshio’s
old friend Yasaka and long held resentments bubble to the fore catalyzed by
this surprise intrusion.
7.
Félicité
15
July / 3 pm / 123 mins / The Projector

A
moving character study of a single mother out to save her hospitalized son, Félicité is a distinct step away from the
moody desperate drama its premise portends. At times hopeful, and other times
fatalist, the film deals an economic deck with its potent mix of urban malaise
and rare kindness that sticks to the conscientious viewer long after the credit
rolls.
Written by Alfonse Chiu