For about three decades, the one surviving print of a local movie had sat undisturbed in the flat of Peter Chong.

Chong, a karate exponent, was the star of Ring of Fury, a 1973 film directed by Tony Yeow and James Sebastian. The film was banned for its plot, in which a hawker seeks revenge on the gangsters who killed his mother.

Previously forgotten and gathering dust, the film can now see the light of day at Screen Singapore, a month-long festival of made-in-Singapore films dating back to 1955. The festival begins today.

It’s your rich film history

The names Chong, Yeow and Sebastian, and the film itself, are unlikely to mean anything to the average cinemagoer today, who would probably be more familiar with the reputation and work of Eric Khoo, Royston Tan and Jack Neo.

Do today’s film fans have any clue that P Ramlee, Hussain Haniff, B N Rao, Jefri Zain and Cleopatra Wong are all names from Singapore’s rich film-making history – a history that has faded into obscurity and appears divorced from local cinema today?

Even among film-makers today, only a few claim to know anything about the Golden Age of Singapore cinema – a period that spanned the 1950s to the 1970s -and say they were inspired by it.

Festival organiser Raphael Millet, the French Embassy’s cultural attach, said he had watched nearly 200 Singapore films in his research, adding that Screen Singapore was a unique opportunity to see films from different eras and compare them.

“Film is one of the best mediums to learn about a country. It’s alive, on screen and you can see it in historical perspective,” he said.

“You can never go back to Singapore in the 1950s, 1960s or 1970s, but you can see it in these movies.

“I would say that Singaporeans deserve to see these films and have an obligation to see them,” he added. “I mean, they’re about (your own culture) and have never been available on screen!”

Millet, who had only seen Khoo’s 12 Storeys prior to coming to Singapore in 2002, said he wanted to organise the festival after he had curated a Singapore film focus for the Paris-Asian Film Festival held in France in March last year.

“After showing Ring of Fury in Paris, I thought it was a paradox that Singaporeans couldn’t see it,” he said.

For the entire month of August, 31 features and 14 short films – some independent, some from the Shaw Brothers and Cathay-Keris vaults – will be shown at the Alliance Fran‧aise Theatre and the Arts House at Old Parliament’s Screening Room. Most films will have multiple screenings.

The festival is also hosting the premiere of Djinn Ong’s Perth as well as Kelvin Tong’s The Maid, both of which will be released commercially on Aug 18.

Heritage ‘re-releases’

The festival, which does not include any films from the barren 1980s period, also highlights the chasm between Singapore cinema’s Golden Age and its resurgence in the mid-1990s.

Singapore’s film industry – once arguably the most successful in the region – is inextricably linked with that of Hong Kong’s.

According to Millet, the first film made by the Cantonese film unit of Shaw Brothers was shot in Singapore.

Shaw also produced Malay films such as 1965’s Jefri Zain ?Gerak Kilat (Jefri was trumpeted as Singapore’s James Bond).

The company hired a young director, Lo Wei, to make spy movies with Malay actors, said Millet. Lo Wei would go on to direct several movies with Bruce Lee – including his first big-action hit Fists of Fury (1971) – and Jackie Chan.

Millet, the author of a book about Singapore cinema that was published in France last year, has a book tailored to the local audience coming out in October. He said Singapore films generally have short lifespans at the cinemas.

The festival will offer fans the chance to not only catch vintage films but also works from the 1990s and the current decade, such as Royston Tan’s 15, Toh Hai Leong’s Zombie Dogs and Lim Suat Yen’s The Road Less Travelled.

Millet hopes the films will continue to be seen after the festival, either at film festivals overseas, in commercial release or on video.

“In France, we have ‘heritage re-release’ of films from people such as (Jean-Luc) Godard,” said Millet. “Why would it be impossible to release in cinemas an old P Ramlee film, or an old Hussain Hanif, whose films were really very good?”

Subtitles and festivals

To help the films’ second chance, the festival is paying to have the vintage films – especially the Malay-language classics – subtitled in English, so that foreign festivals will have more incentive to feature them.

Millet added that the festival would consider a fund-raising campaign after this month to help restore Ring of Fury to its former glory. The film has missing parts, the result of the censor’s scissors, and a pinkish hue that is a product of deterioration.

Millet believes that some films – such as the first colour movie ever shot in Singapore, Buloh Perindu in 1953, and the first-ever Pontianak horror movie made here – are lost forever.

“Maybe somebody could distribute Ring of Fury, or do a video edition at least,” he said.

what: Screen Singapore (www.screensingapore.com)

where: Alliance Francaise and The Arts House at Old Parliament

when: Today until Aug 31; tickets available through the Arts House (www.theartshouse.com.sg, 6332-6919)

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Channel News Asia