If my internship at AFA were a movie, it would undoubtedly be a thriller. Frantic action ensues with a cast of hard-boiled characters as they encounter looming deadlines, terse phone calls and fast-forwarded movies. The body count as yet stands at zero.

As part of the Special Programmes segment for the Pre-University Seminar 2008, the Asian Film Archive co-organized three film screenings with Meridian Junior College on 28 May 08 for 600 students from local junior colleges and polytechnics at Nanyang Technological University.  The aim of the screenings was to sensitize the participants to our socio-economic environment through the viewing and discussion of Asian or Singaporean films.

The film screening segment showcased 3 ASEAN films – Sepet by Yasmin Ahmad, The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros by Auraeus Solito, and Joni’s Promise by Joko Anwar.

Yasmin Ahmad and Raymond Lee (producer of The Blossoming of Maximos Oliveros ), together with Associate Professor Roxana Waterson from the National University of Singapore, were also invited as speakers to conduct post-screening discussions with the students.

The films were showed concurrently in three lecture theatres and drew bouts of laughter, cheers and tears from the student audiences. After which, the post-screening discussions began with the help of MJC student facilitators and the respective speakers in a Q&A format.

It was an engaging and lively discussion as students eagerly posted questions to the speakers on the symbolism of certain scenes as well as the social context in which the film was presented. The audience also had the opportunity to interact with Yasmin Ahmad and Raymond Lee from the perspective of a filmmaker and film producer with regards to the film. For Joni’s Promise, Associate Professor Roxana Waterson offered a sociological perspectives on the film and drew upon her understanding of Indonesian society based on her research as an anthropologist.

After the session, many students continued to stay back in the LT to crowd around the speakers with more questions and to voice their feedback. The speakers were heartened by the feedback and commented that they enjoyed answering the interesting questions raised by the students, as well as witnessing the reactions from the students during the screening.

It was a wonderful experience for us, and we hope it was an engaging and entertaining session for the students. We would like to extend our thanks and heartfelt appreciation to the speakers for gracing this event, as well as to the organizing committee of the Pre-University Seminar 2008 for partnering the Asian Film Archive to showcase Asian Cinema.

In May, the Asian Film Archive organized a series of 3 Educators' Workshops, featuring our guest instructors Alfian Sa’at (resident playwright with W!ld Rice), Raymond Lee (co-writer and producer of The Blossoming of Maximos Oliveros) and Chong Wing Hong (senior writer of Lianhe Zaobao).

Alfian Sa'at's workshop on "Singapore Culture and Identity through Its Films" started the ball rolling on 26 May. The screenings of various local short and feature films served as a springboard for hearty discussions on the topics of multiculturalism, policy planning and international relations. The participants clearly had an enlightening and invigorating time sharing their reactions of the films, and exploring the questions raised by Alfian for group discussions.

On 28 May, Raymond Lee conducted his workshop on "Storytelling for Film". Drawing on his experience as a film producer and writer, Raymond taught the participants the fundamental conventions in film plotting, narrative devices, and character development. Raymond and the participants launched into many engaging discussions with the enthusiastic participants. After the workshop, participants were eager to ask Raymond questions about his experiences as a film producer and scriptwriter.

Last but not least, Chong Wing Hong conducted a workshop on "Understanding Chinese Culture through Cinema" on 29 May. Using two Chinese classics, East Flows the Yangtze and Spring in a Small Town, Wing Hong explained the social context of the films, and showed the stark contrast between their handling of themes and the responses the films garnered.

Here are some of the testimonials we gathered from this round of Educators' Workshop:

• “(I like the) useful film snippets and pedagogical potential demonstrated, insights into multi-layered meanings of (the) film…very good questions for reflections on film.”
  - Marilyn Lim from Ministry Of Education, on Singapore Culture and Identity through Its Films
• “Good discussion sessions, good variety of films.”
  - Erin Woodford from Temasek Junior College, on Singapore Culture and Identity through Its Films
• “(I like) that the facilitator was so open to dialogue and sharing his thoughts with us. Very thought-provoking questions raised. Thank you! Really enjoyed myself!”
  - Lai E-von from Ministry Of Education, on Singapore Culture and Identity through Its Films
• “The instructor clearly knows the craft well, which made the session enriching.”
  – Dayna Lim from Ministry Of Education, on Storytelling for Film
• “(I like the) interaction and sharing between instructor and participants, (as well as between) participants and participants.”
  - Heng Swee Kiang from Temasek Junior College, on Storytelling for Film
• “(I like) the personal experience shared by speaker (and) the informal atmosphere”
  - Teo Boon Leng from Geylang Methodist Secondary School on Storytelling for Film
• “Instructor used 2 films as examples for the entire workshop (which) provides in-depth analysis of the films (and) facilitates understanding.” – Ray Ng from Ngee Ann Polytechnic on Understanding Chinese Culture Through Cinema

A big thank you to all the participants who attended our workshops in May 2008. Do look out for our upcoming series of Educators' Workshops in September and November 2008!

To receive updates on our upcoming events, please submit your name and email address to info@asianfilmarchive.org in order to be on our mailing list.

Last week, Raj, Lucy and I were in New York for the 6th Orphan Film Symposium organised by NYU Cinema Studies and its Moving Image Archiving and Preservation programme.

One of our volunteers, Adam Habib who taught at Ngee Ann told me about this great symposium 2 years back. He was from the University of South Carolina where the symposium was birthed. This biennale event attracts orphanistas, consisting of scholars, artists, archivists, collectors, curators, conservators and enthusiasts. The organisors even called the collection of such films - the orphanage. So when does a film become an orphan (from 5th Symposium):

1. one deprived of protection or advantage (orphans of the storm).Outtakes, like his mother's home movies, deteriorated because no archive would store or preserve them.orphan

2. an item not developed or marketed because its limited use makes it unprofitable (an orphan drug).Charles Burnett's "Killer of Sheep" became an orphan film for twenty years because no distributor would pick up this challenging work.orphan

3. a discontinued model (an orphan automobile). The aviatrix recorded some remarkable aerial footage, but she found herself with a set of orphan films when no lab would develop her 9.5mm footage.

Picture courtesy of 6th Orphan Film Symposium

It's a great honour to open the symposium with our presentations after the keynote address by Paolo Cherchi Usai.

Karen, our archivist, and I developed a paper on the independence of Rajendra Gour's films. Like many early filmmakers, Gour was not native to Singapore. He came here from India after graduating from the Pune Film Institute. However, he was brought in to train the television industry and never a studios director. He stinged to make his films on 16mm in the 60s and 70s with his own money. Despite gaining international recognition, there wasn't much government support for his works. In 1981, he made a national appeal on Straits Times for funding to preserve his films. That did not happen until 2005 when the Asian Film Archive and the National Archives of Singapore, in a private-public partnership, come together to preserve Singapore and Asian cinema. Gour attended the event to present the audio-restored version of Labour of Love, made possible courtesy of the Overseas Travel Grant by the Singapore Film Commission.

Two of our former interns, Lucy and Pauline, developed a paper on the Film Act and its implication on the Asian Film Archive preserving banned films using the case study of Martyn See's political works which are critical of the state.

Other presentors include the Ross Lipman (the inspiring archivist who almost single-handedly established a tradition of preserving avant-garde and independent American film, including the complicated and demanding preservation of Charles Burnett's Killer of Sheep), Rick Prelinger, Professor Charles Musser (who directs the film studies programme at Yale), Professor Howard Besser (who directs NYU's Moving Image Archiving and Preservation programme), Dan Drasin (filmmaker who made Sunday in 1961 at the age of 18) and many more. I also chanced upon the illuminious film historian Harvard Professor Scott Macdonald, author of The Garden In the Machine that I was reading a while back.

There were alot of films restored for the symposium and presented (sometimes even newly scored by the NYU film students). Two films stuck to mind: Sam Fuller’s Falkenau liberation footage (1945) about the Nazi concentration camps and Representations of Disability in Scientific and Educational Films presented by Laura Kissel.

The symposium ended with the state dinner on the 10th floor of the Kimmel building with a grand view of the New York City. From left, here's me with Rick Prelinger (who spent his life building the Prelinger Library and fighting against copyrights laws that are against public benefit - see Kahle/Prelinger vs. Ashcroft), Rajendra Gour (who was in U.S for the first time to attend a screening of his works which received two awards there in the 60-70s) and Dan Streible (the illuminous organisor of the symposium who was such a wonderful host and put together the most marvelous programme).

While in New York, I also met up with Singapore filmmakers - Yen Yen and Colin, as well as Amrin, who volunteered with AFA as our legal consultant in our first two years before he left for NY.

- Bee Thiam