Singapore Dreaming

In the Mood for Love

In 1960s Hong Kong, two neighbors form an intimate bond after making a discovery about their spouses in this visually stunning tale of unrequited love.

Siew Lup

Mia, an ex-prostitute, is trapped in a loveless marriage with the abusive Quan (Sunny Pang, who also stars in Headshot in this year’s Festival lineup), a butcher who runs a roast meat shop. When she meets sensitive funeral director Wu, their passion for one another escalates into an affair. But the path to true love is fraught with jealousy, forcing someone to make a deadly move.

Republic of Food

In a world where food has been outlawed, a small band of food lovers risks their skins to defy the authorities and feast on contraband food.

Crazy Rich Asians

An American-born Chinese economics professor accompanies her boyfriend to Singapore for his best friend's wedding, only to get thrust into the lives of Asia's rich and famous.

Repossession

50-year-old Jim (Gerald Chew, "Apprentice", Cannes Film Festival 2016 Un Certain Regard) loses his high-flying job in status-conscious Singapore, but his ego and pride compel him to hide this from his wife (Amy J Cheng, "Crazy Rich Asians") and daughter. His only confidante is his best friend (Sivakumar Palakrishnan, "A Yellow Bird", Cannes Film Festival 2016 Critics' Week). Desperately clinging onto the material symbols of his past success, he unlocks a hibernating malevolent force, with sinister roots in long-buried secrets. As his dream life crumbles around him, worlds collide, the lines between then and now become increasingly blurred, and Jim descends into a waking nightmare. REPOSSESSION is a bold, genre-bending film, with an ever-evolving, haunting soundscape from Golden Horse Award-winning composer Teo Wei Yong ("A Land Imagined").

World for Ransom

In Singapore, a private detective and the British authorities are on the trail of a crime syndicate that kidnaps a nuclear physicist with the aim of selling him to the highest bidder.

The Letter

After a woman shoots a man to death, a damning letter she wrote raises suspicions.

#LookAtMe

A Youtuber posts an irreverent video trolling a megachurch pastor, in defence of his gay twin brother. He is vilified by society, tried in court, and pitted against a culture that threatens to destroy his family.

Road to Singapore

Two playboys try to forget previous romances in Singapore – until they meet a beautiful dancer.

15

Five troubled teens, abandoned by society and family, form a bond in a world of violence, drugs, and self-destruction, facing harsh realities of modern Singapore.

Gift

John despises his father for being a failure in life. When John returns home to facilitate his father's funeral, his life comes to a turning point, as he discovers the true motivation of his misjudged father.

Crocodile Rock

My Magic

A single dad looks to give up drinking and his bartender job in order to impress his son and find work as a magician.

881

Two Singaporean girls join together to form the Papaya Sisters, a getai group that sings at performances during the seventh lunar month. Big Papaya is estranged from her mother, who disapproves of her performances, whilst Little Papaya is an orphan who suffers from terminal cancer. The two are assisted by Auntie Ling and her son, Guan Yin. The two soon rise to the top of the Singaporean getai scene singing traditional Hokkien songs, but their fame brings along with it the enmity of the Durian Sisters, a rival group of techno-singing Eurasian girls.

Absence

After a family patriarch's passing, mother and son set off on different paths to cope with the loss. While the mother finds solace in religion and prayers, the son expresses himself through art. Unbeknownst to them, they are set on a collision course with one another, with life-altering consequences.

I Not Stupid

Kok Pin, Boon Hock and Terry are classmates in "EM3" stream. In Singapore, that means that at the age of 12, the government has decided that they are not as academically inclined as their peers. Kok Pin is creative and a born artist but his parents would rather he focus on his Maths and Sciences. Boon Hock comes from a low-income family and needs to balance school and helping out at the food stall. Terry, a spoilt brat is just too lazy a student. While the three children suffer from the pressure of school, their parents have another set of problems - their jobs and careers.

Cut

A musical, all-singing, all-dancing, attack on censorship in Singaporean movies

MUM

As Singapore extends its lockdown amidst the Covid-19 pandemic, a work-from-home mother fights for her job while her domestic helper seizes an opportunity to do the unthinkable. But nothing is ever as they seem. A cautionary tale about 2 mothers, lives overlooked and voices mummed, /mʌm/ is a psychological drama with elements of an evocative thriller that examines Singaporeans’ symbiotic relationship with migrant workers.

I Not Stupid Too

A 2006 Singaporean film and the sequel to the 2002 film, I Not Stupid. A satirical comedy, I Not Stupid Too portrays the lives, struggles and adventures of three Singaporean youths - 15-year-old Tom, his 8-year-old brother Jerry and their 15-year-old friend Chengcai - who have a strained relationship with their parents. The film explores the issue of poor parent-child communication.

Pleasure Factory

A series of intertwining tales involve "pleasure seekers and pleasure providers" during the course of one night in Geylang, Singapore's red-light district. There are three distinct stories, united only by the presence of characters from all the stories in a streetside eatery: