IFFR Rotterdam Lab 2022

happy to share that i'll be participating in International Film Festival Rotterdam's Rotterdam Lab for emerging producers online from next week! iffr.com/en/dan-koh

although it sucks that we can't be there physically—at a festival and city that's taught me so much—it's still an honour to be virtually amongst, share with, and learn from the 73 participants, who are predominantly female (46 of them), from 37 countries, including many developing ones.

my participation there is thanks to the support of Infocomm Media Development Authority - IMDA, who nominated me and another SG producer Tan Jia Min (iffr.com/en/jia-min-tan) and sponsored our participation fees—thank you especially to Joycelyn Khoo, Adam He, and Kristin Saw for the help. i look forward to meeting/seeing other film/cultural workers there (last year they had a cool online space where you could camp your avatar in the toilets, for example, to chat with others—nobody joined me there...), and also interacting with these exciting producers, especially:

iffr.com/en/gita-fara iffr.com/en/yoko-ide iffr.com/en/hikaru-toda iffr.com/en/carol-kioko iffr.com/en/nakyong-gigi-yoom iffr.com/en/benji-lim iffr.com/en/stelle-laguda iffr.com/en/shao-min-chew-chia

for more info and the full list of participants: iffr.com/en/blog/rotterdam-lab-2022.

obligatory years-end film list (1 year late)

fortifying new/recent feature films seen since pandemic, amidst ongoing personal disillusionment with the filmic & other arts:

37 seconds – hikari a beautiful day in the neighbourhood – marielle heller a hidden life – terrence malick

a man and a camera – guido hendrikx a rifle and a bag – isabella rinaldi, cristina hanes & arya rothe all about my sisters – wang qiong all-in – volkan üce an unusual summer – kamal aljafari anatomy of time – jakrawal nilthamrong aswang – alyx ayn arumpac atlantics – mati diop bloody nose, empty pockets – turner ross & bill ross iv bottled songs 1–4 – kevin b. lee & chloé galibert-laîné brother’s keeper – ferit karahan collective – alexander nanau faces across the other side – zhang ximing faya dayi – jessica bashir fire will come – oliver laxe first cow – kelly reichardt fourteen – dan sallitt from victoria street to ang mo kio – eva tang great freedom – sebastian meise her socialist smile – john gianvito history of ha – lav diaz homeless – lim seung-hyeun inside the red brick wall – hong kong documentary filmmakers just don’t think i’ll scream – frank beauvais la civil – teodara ana mihai landscapes of resistance – marta popivoda looking for venera – norika sefa lovers rock – steve mcqueen mariam – sharipa urazbayeva moffie – oliver hermanus moving on – yoon dan-bi nan – peng zu-qiang nasir – arun karthick night of the kings – philippe lacôte nothing but the sun – aramí ullón overseas – sung-a yoon petit samedi – paloma sermon-daï portrait of a lady on fire – céline sciamma quo vadis, aida? – jasmila žbanić rain in 2020 – lee yong chao rewind – sasha joseph neulinger scarecrow – dmitry davydov school town king – wattanapume laisuwanchai self-portrait 2020 – lee dong-woo sexual drive – kōta yoshida silent voice – reka valerik soil without land – nontawat numbenchapol staying vertical – alain guiraudie suk suk – ray yeung sundown – michel franco that cloud never left – yashaswini raghunandan the cloud in her room – zheng lu xinyuan the broken ridge – jiang jin the father – florian zeller the girl and the spider – ramon zürcher & silvan zürcher the mole agent – maite alberdi the once and future – yeo siew hua the painter and the thief – benjamin ree the truth – hirokazu koreeda the velvet underground – todd haynes the witches of the orient – julien faraut the year of the discovery – luis lópez carrasco the year of the everlasting storm – apichatpong weerasethakul, jafar panahi, laura poitras, david lowery, dominga sotomayor, anthony chen & malik vitthal thomas the high jumper – leri matehha time – garrett bradley to the ends of the earth – kiyoshi kurosawa undine – christian petzold varda by agnès – agnès varda vengeance is mine, all others pay cash – edwin we are from there – wissam tanios welcome to chechnya – david france what do we see when we look at the sky? – alexandre oberidze wheel of fortune and fantasy – ryusuke hamaguchi whether the weather is fine – carlo francisco manatad wisdom tooth – liang ming you and i – fanny chotimah

(sorry if i left your film out or haven’t seen it yet, this arbitrary list does not matter at all)

STILL: Kiarostami via Cinematic

X’ with an X

“So for the uninitiated, here’s the X who still marks the spot.”

in 2019, (the artist formerly known as) Chris Ho was the worthy, long-overdue subject of historian Lim Cheng Tju’s deep dive into X’ Ho—X’ with an X—the radio and club DJ, musician, writer, filmmaker, cultural fighter, and my friend of the last decade. Cheng Tju’s profile and interview in Mynah Magazine, issue 3, contained the above pull quote that came to mind when X’ died of stomach cancer on 27 sep, when he was forever 27 years old (because his real age is really no one’s business).

since then, X’ himself has kept returning to my mind—not that he ever left it, really. he returns to me in dreams—i wake up with wet eyes—in waking life—when i watch a China movie he loved/loathed—in $ingapore, as he used to spell it, when i pass by eateries and toilets we had bumped into each other in, when i listen to homegrown music he sparked off, directly or through a long line of influence, when i remember his voice. that voice. his voice that i grew up on, staying up late at night to hear his shows on Perfect 10 987FM and later Lush 99.5FM; echoing in his columns for BigO and ST; ringing out clearly in his multidecade-long discography; his voice that spoke to me once we were introduced by Vivian Wang, which came through on WhatsApp, over email, through FB, IG, and most memorably in person when we hung out, like when he came over to my parents’ place and greeted my mom (a dedicated Gold 90.5FM listener, who X’ accompanied over the airwaves in recent years) so sweetly that she, a retired teacher, could naturally look past his skinhead and tattoos.

this minor memorial comes belatedly because i don’t have much to add, and it’s not really my place. X’ had many closer friends and collaborators, many of whom remember him in this surprisingly fitting and recommended tribute by CNA, "Chris Ho: No Ordinary Punk" [Also check out this podcast tribute by Ujikaji, "Outsiders"—Ed.]. most touchingly and true, in it actress and voice teacher Nora Samosir shares between tears, “he was a very gentle person…with Chris, I don’t know, I always wanted to manja him.”

i simply would like to add to the array of voices, all touched and manja-ed by X’ over the years, and say thank you X’. thank you for being our Lou Reed (heh, X’s last FB post was on the new VU docu), our John Peel (first spotlighting humpback oak, Force Vomit, and so many others), for sparking off independent thought, music, writing, and culture during an era when even long hair was verboten, in a country where to this day we are executing the mentally disabled. thank you for being a personal bastion of freedom. for your sacrifices, especially in your last decade on earth, when you showed me, without words, how you so freely gave up your lifelong dream to migrate to stay and look after your mother, how during one of my breakdowns you told me that we have to learn to accept ourselves completely despite our flaws, how it is fundamentally and ultimately worth it—to someone, somewhere, to yourself—to keep making art even if it doesn’t sustain a living, even if it brings governmental and public opprobrium, for like your music and writing and voice, it’s bigger than life, it’s longer than existence, it keeps ringing out and it keeps echoing in my and many others’ minds. one day, i hope to be as brave as you always were at forever 27.

thank you for the last playlist you played at your wake—you really never stop working, eh? thank you for the nick drake, the joni mitchell, the rickie lee jones, the hardcore punk, the electroclash, the blackest of black metal, for your classic album with ARCNTEMPL, for Zircon Lounge and Transformer, for “Deeper”, for Zircon Gov. Pawn Starz, for your “DJ Mentor's Beijing Fireworks”, Alfian Sa'at-sampling remix of one of my fave The Observatory song “Anger & Futility”, for your movies (i’m sorry i didn’t do your porn film) and documentary portraits, for your zines and books and social media, for daring to be a loner, for always being open to love, for being a true friend, first and foremost.

we will cry together at the movies, again, some other time. until then, i keep the red thread from your funeral, return it to you there. love you, miss you, manja you, always, thank you, X’.

guide these hands xxx