BooksActually
presents
Old Places
A Documentary by
Royston Tan, Eva Tang, Victric Thng
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D : Tuesday, 10th May 2011
T : 7.30 pm
V : BooksActually
Old Places, a documentary directed by Singaporean filmmakers Royston Tan, Victric Thng and Eva Tang, first screened on Okto on the eve of National Day 2010. Featuring the voices of Singaporeans recalling their memories of disappearing places in Singapore, it recorded the highest ratings for any documentary screened this year and received an overwhelming number of requests from the public. As a result, Okto arranged a repeat screening on Tuesday 24th August.
Nostalgic, sentimental and at times, gently admonishing, this is a film that every Singaporean should see. Amidst Singapore’s rapid urban development, these spaces are our memories, our history, and our loss.
“I want to archive these places before they are lost forever.”
− Royston Tan
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A B O U T T H E F I L M M A K E R S
Royston Tan
A graduate from Temasek Polytechnic, Royston Tan’s films have screened worldwide at film festivals and received over 75 awards. He has made 4 feature-length films and continues to work within the short film genre when the right idea comes along. Tan is one of the most influential filmmakers locally. In 2002, the National Arts Council honoured him with the Young Artist Award. In 2004, Time Magazine cited Tan as one of the ‘Top 20 Asian Heroes’. Tan received the Singapore Youth Award, the highest youth accolade from the National Youth Council, in 2010.
His works were outstanding since his days as a student when he won awards such as the NTU's All-School Students' Photo-Videographic Competition: First prize for Music Video "Remains" (1995) and the UTV International Book Prize for “Adam.Eve.Steve” (1997).
After graduation, Tan received the Best Short Film and Special Achievement Award for the short film “Sons” in 2000. In 2001, his short film “Mother” received the Voice Award at The Substation’s Singapore Short Film Festival. He has won two awards at Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival, one of the most important short film festivals worldwide – the Canal+ Award 2005 for "Cut" and the Grand Prix for "Monkeylove" in 2007.
Tan remains one of the filmmakers in Singapore who can straddle both the commercial film world and the international film festival critics. His film, “881” grossed over S$3 million; making it the top grossing Asian film in Singapore in 2007. In 2009, he was invited to be part of the Jury at the Shanghai International Film Festival.
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Eva Tang
Born in Singapore, Eva Tang has lived and studied in Hong Kong, London and China. When she was offered a scholarship from the Singapore Film Commission, she resigned from her journalist job of 5 years and went on to study film. She was the first Singaporean filmmaker who had her student short selected by the Venice Film Festival in 2002.
Eva is a MA (Directing) graduate of the National Film and Television School. Her student film “Londres – London” won the Governor Award of the Akira Kurosawa Memorial Short Film Competition. It also won Best Artistic Film in Shanghai, Jury Recommendation at the Hong Kong Independent Short Film & Video Awards, and was nominated for Best Short Film at Hawaii and Bangkok International Film Festivals. The National Gallery of Art (USA) also picked it up for screening. Her film, “Solitary Moon” was awarded the First Prize at The Great Gatsby Video Challenge, part of the Singapore Arts Festival 2010.
Eva was selected for the 2009 Berlinale Talent Campus, 2010 Torino FilmLab training and 2010 Taipei Golden Horse Film Academy led by Hou Hsiao-Hsien.
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Victric Thng
Cited as “one of the new wave directors to look out for” by The Straits Times, Victric Thng’s filmmaking career started when he made a 3-minute short film “Locust” (2003). The film won the Renault Samsung Prize in the Busan Asian Short Film Festival, Best Asean Short Film Silver Award at the Malaysian Video Awards and also screened at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. “Locust” remains one of the most highly requested films from festivals today. He has since made 11 other short films including more recently, “The Mole” (2007), which won first prize at the Panasonic-MDA Digital Film Fiesta 2007, and “Twogether” (2007) which screened at the 27th San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival in 2009. In 2009, he executive produced the short film series “Infinity” which premiered at the 22nd Singapore International Film Festival. He was commissioned by the National Arts Council in 2009 and 2010 to direct a film under the dance/film programme, as part of the Singapore Arts Festival. “A Day Without Wind”, which was the dance film commissioned in 2009, travelled to the Asian Hot Shots Festival 2010 in Berlin, Germany.
He has been invited to jury regionally at festivals including in Macau and in Singapore, the 7th Fly By Night Video Challenge 2009. In 2009, John Badalu in Jakarta curated a retrospective of his works.
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