We are a group of 5 students researching on film advocacy and ways to market a film successfully.
Name: Andrew Tan (Group Leader)
Age: 15 +
D.O.B.: 21st June 1991
School: Raffles Institution
CCAs: Raffles Institution Military Band, Raffles Institution AV Club
Interests: Music, Movies, Flute, MSN Messenging
Name: Ng Yu Hui
Age: 15+
D.O.B.: 3rd April 1991
School: Raffles Institution
CCAs: Raffles Institution National Police Cadet Corp, Raffles Institution Science Club
Interests: Movies, MSN Messenging, Music
Name: Tek Yong Jian
Age: 15 +
D.O.B.: 26th June 1991
School: Raffles Institution
CCAs: Raffles Institution National Police Cadet Corp, Raffles Institution AV Club
Interests: Music, Movies, MSN Messenging, Soccer
Name: Desmond Kan
Age: 15+
D.O.B.: 21st November 1991
School: Raffles Institution
CCAs: Raffles Institution National Police Cadet Corp, Raffles Institution AV Club, Raffles Institution Maths Club
Interests: Music, Movies, MSN Messenging
Name: Kwah Yi Hao
Age: 16
D.O.B.:
School: Raffles Institution
CCAs: Raffles Institution Chinese Orchestra
Interests: Music, Movies, MSN Messenging
Wednesday, February 21, 2007 First Meeting at Asian Film Archives
Today was our first visit to the Asian Film Archives, or at least we were outside but didn't get to go in.
We had our second meeting with our expert mentor, Mr. Tan Bee Thiam as well as another film producer, Mr. Ming Wong. Mr. Ming Wong was actually an old RI boy, and is currently a film producer and artist, based in London, who is also looking for lost Asian Films as well as recreating certain (lost) old films.
During this meeting, we discussed about our experience and what we've learnt from the screening of "Sarjan Hassan". Questions like "Why were/are WWII films less made in Asia than Hollywood?", "Why wasn't 'Sarjan Hassan' screened in an actual Open-air/'Starlight' theatre?", and many others were raised, propelling the discussion further. We found out that "Sarjan Hassan" was actually shown on Suria on a regular basis, yet not many even know about it.
This would further highlight the lack of interest of Singaporeans for (old) Asian films.
As we moved on to discuss our project ideas, we had feedback that we should come up with a definition of "Advocacy", and what our true aim(s)/purpose(s) would be. We were also given questions as to whether we were "advocating film as a medium", "advocating film as an art form" or "advocating (meaningful) messages through films". These really made us ponder over our current direction of our project, as we would find that we have been actually focusing too much on the "materialistic" aspect of film advocacy, which would most probably only be in the final stages, such as advertising, film screening and others.
What we should have been focusing on are actually the values of whatever movies that we might decide to advocate, and more importantly, identify missing gaps in the way Asian films were & are being advocated, which could most probably be the causes of the lack of appeal and popularity. Secondly, from identifying these gaps, what could we actually do to fill in these gaps, and how would the community/society/even the world could benefit/learn from it.
All in all, although this meeting had sort of driven us back to square one, we now had clearer vision of how we were actually going to carry out our project, and how we could actually make an impact on the society, rather than just a one-shot event with little value.
