Experimental Film Forum

Thursday 20 to Sunday 23 May 2010
The Substation Theatre
Admission: Entry by Donation
For more info, please visit http://www.substation.org/EFF
Presented by The Substation Moving Images

Come and experience an exploratory form of cinema with The Substation at the inaugural Experimental Film Forum. Organised and presented by The Substation Moving Images, this forum aims to put the spotlight on experimental films, a largely neglected area in film making. This year’s festival will feature a screening of experimental works, a forum and a workshop.
Experimental film is an important medium for the expression of concepts and ideas otherwise inaccessible or inexpressible through traditional mediums. Similar to experiments in the physical world, these cinematic experiments in light, sound and image have the potential to produce wondrous and explosive results which can help expand our understanding of cinema.

The first Experimental Film Forum will open with the seminal film, Mysterious Object at Noon, by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand’s foremost experimental film auteur and the winner of a jury prize at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival.

Film-goers can expect a carefully curated showcase of experimental work by local film makers such as Loo Zihan and K Rajagopal. There will also be a special highlight of experimental short films by Tania Sng, a local film maker whose experimental film work has been screened and seen around the world. The festival will also cater to more foreign tastes in a separate programme of international fare by directors such as León Siminiani and Chris Chong .

Aside from screenings, Russell Zehnder, a well known practitioner of Super8 film making, will be conducting an introductory workshop where participants can learn to appreciate the beauty of working with Super8 film, a rustic film medium often favored by experimental film makers. The workshop will also feature a screening of Super8 films curated by Norwood Cheek, who runs the Flicker film festival in Los Angeles, an event solely dedicated to showcasing Super8 films.

As part of the festival, there will also be a discussion forum that will explore the historical development of experimental cinema in Southeast Asia, as well as its current state and its future in an increasingly digitised world.

Closing the festival will be Ho Tzu Nyen’s much talked about work, Earth, which last travelled to the prestigious 66th Venice Film Festival and the International Film Festival Rotterdam.