Calling all students! If you need a break from revisions, or—if you’re lucky—looking for ways to spend some of your post-exam downtime, try catching these four films at SGIFF: all weekday afternoon screenings at The Arts House. What’s more, we’re offering a special Weekday Matinee Students’ Special Package: get tickets to all four screenings for just $32 – that’s $16 cheaper than the standard price. For more details on the package, visit our Ticketing Information page.
1. The Fourth Direction
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1 Dec, Tue / 4:30PM / The Arts House
Based on two short stories by Waryam Singh Sandhu,
is set during the historical conflict between Sikh separatists and the military. Two Hindu friends Jugal and Raj missed the last train to Amritsar. They barge into a cargo train, where they find themselves in the company of other illegal passengers. Months earlier, a family living in a rural farmhouse is caught between the opposing forces when their dog barks ceaselessly at night, breaking the veil of silence.
2. Snow Pirates
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2 Dec, Wed / 4:30PM / The Arts House
Three boys spend their school holidays trying to find coal for warmth against all odds, set against the coup d’état in 1980 Turkey. Responsibilities of life are prematurely imposed on them. They know the value of coal because it means survival, but will soon learn that it might also be the fuel for resistance against the junta. For them, cruelty and curfews underpin normality.
3. The Kids
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3 Dec, Thu / 4:30PM / The Arts House
In this sweet and poignant tale about the perils of young love and its consequences, the headstrong Pao-li (Wu Chien-ho) is a responsible teenage husband and father to his wife Jia-jia (Wen Chen-ling) and their daughter. The trio lives with Pao-li’s gambler mother (Yang Chi) in a single room flat. Life may not be a bed of roses, but Pao-li has plans to move to a bigger apartment to rekindle his relationship with the increasingly distant Jia-jia. As the film unfolds, we are offered glimpses of the couple’s burgeoning love story, which puts into context the characters’ various motivations as they struggle to cope with family life and even, infidelities.
4. The House By the Bamboo Grove
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4 Dec, Fri / 4:30PM / The Arts House
Michelle leads a simple and unhurried life in her bamboo house, only going out to the town once a week to charge her phone or watch a movie. In a place where everyone dreams of being somewhere else, Michelle finds herself inseparable from her home to the point of obsession. A love letter to the small things that make up life in Barangay Salvacion in Baao, the film offers glimpses of the multitude of stories around those who struggle to tell their own.