There’s nothing more satisfactory than completing a film which teaches us something about ourselves or the world around us. In its sixth season, cINE65 2021, still helms itself as Singapore’s largest national platform for budding filmmakers and film students. With a powerful line-up of workshops and talks conducted by established industry veterans, participants are in for a real treat.
This year’s theme is “Stronger, Together”. While it seems vaguely patriotic, it calls upon the vulnerability of Singaporean stories surrounding resilience and unity as a nation. In hopes of being as inclusive as possible, the workshops and talks are mostly free and will be conducted either online or at physical locations.
Participants can submit their 3-minute short films before 18 April 2021 and stand a chance to win an opportunity to understudy a director of a feature film by mm2 Entertainment.
Some highlights of cINE65 2021 include:
Low Budget Filmmaking
For budding filmmakers, the cost of making a short film can often seem like a logistical nightmare. While the tug of war between funding and artists never seems to end, this talk shows participants how you can make a short film with what you already have.
Join established filmmakers such as Daniel Hui, Tan Siyou and Nelson Yeo as they reveal their top tips and tricks when managing budget and funding.
Daniel Hui is a graduate of the film program at California Institute of Arts and is a founding member of 13 Little Pictures, a critically acclaimed independent film collective in Singapore. His feature-length film, Demons, has won the Kim Jiseok Award and was featured at the Busan IFF 2018 and Berlinale Forum 2019.
Tan Siyou is a Singaporean filmmaker based in Los Angeles. She is an alumna of the AFI’s Directing Workshop for Women, the Asian Film Academy, and a current fellow at the Universal Directors’ Initiative. Her most recent short film, Hello Ahma, played in competition at the Toronto International Film Festival and the Berlinale. She also graduated from Wesleyan University.
Nelson Yeo is a Singaporean filmmaker who graduated from Nanyang Technological University in 2011 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Digital Filmmaking. His recent short films, Mary, Mary, So Contrary (2019) and Here is Not There (2019), have been selected for international film festivals such as Internationale Kurzfilmtage Winterthur, Kurzfilm Festival Hamburg and Cairo International Film Festival.
The workshop is free and will be hosted online. It will take place on 3 March 2021, Wednesday from 7:30pm to 9pm.
In Conversation: Film Collaborations
Filmmaking isn’t all about the director, it is a collaborative effort and the team that assists you play an important role in shaping the vision of a film. And once you’ve found a winning combination, it is more than likely that you’d want to continue that relationship.
This talk sees Yeo Siew Hua and Fran Borgia share the details of how they made their working relationship succeed and the importance of good collaborators on a film.
Yeo Siew Hua made 2018’s A Land Imagined, which won the Golden Leopard at the 71st Locarno Film Festival and is Singapore’s entry to the Academy Awards (Oscars) 2020. He is also a founding member of the 13 Little Pictures film collective and a member of the Asia Pacific Screen Academy.
Fran Borgia has been based in Singapore for the last 15 years and produced several critically acclaimed films such as Boo Junfengʼs Apprentice (Cannes Un Certain Regard 2016) and K. Rajagopalʼs A Yellow Bird (Cannes Criticsʼ Week 2016). His collaborations with Yeo Siew Hua include the film A Land Imagined.
The workshop is free and will be hosted online. It will take place on 10 March 2021, Wednesday from 7:30pm to 9pm.
There’s more stuff to experience during cINE65 2021. To see the full list of workshops and talks and their details, check out cINE65’s official Facebook.
Visuals courtesy of cINE65.
