INDIERAG: INTERVIEWS: Djinn

FRONT PAGE

ABOUT

SUBMIT

CONTACT

ADVERTISE

Search the rag

About the rag

Submit to the rag

Advertise with the rag

Contact the rag

[INTERVIEWS > DJINN]

04/05/01

Djinn (aka Ong Lay Jinn)

Interview with filmmaker Djinn, who made the first digital feature "Return to Pontianak" in Singapore, an art house horror movie modernizing the Asian "Pontianak" legend

DJINN (aka Ong Lay Jinn) has just made his first feature "Return to Pontianak," an art-house/horror tale film set in the jungle of Singapore about black magic and supernatural power. Djinn has lived and worked between Los Angeles and Singapore for the past five years in films and documentaries. His short "By the Dawn's Early Rise" won 1998 Singapore International Film Festival's Best Short Film Award. His film career began as an assistant director on one of Singapore first feature films in the 90s, "Bugis Street," directed by Hong Kong's premiere art house director Yonfan.independent film project. The following interview chronicled the conception of "Bunny" to the struggle of bringing it to light.

iR: First of all, what the hell is "Pontianak"?

"Pontianak" was originally a Malay or Polynesian legend, but they also have a similar legend in Thailand, the Philippines, and Indonesia. The "Pontianak" is a woman who dies from childbirth or by abuse from men. Her corpse is then used by black magicians for supernatural power, and she becomes a walking undead. She has long hair and appears very beautiful to men at first, and then she shows her evil side and ravages them. She can also turn into a creature that floats above the ground and disembowels young men.

iR: How did the idea of making a movie on "Pontianak" come to you?

My friend who¹s a comic artist did a comic book called "Pontianak." I found it very unique because it amalgamated genres of kung fu and horror. This legend has been dormant for the past 30 years and no one has done anything on it. Back in the 60s, there was in fact a genre of "Pontianak" films and it was very popular. But then South East Asian cinema died due to cheap Hollywood and Bollywood imports. I was interested in reviving this whole genre again, which is basically a subgenre of B-grade horror films.

iR: So what is the story of your movie, "Return to Pontianak"?

The Malay black magician in "Return to Pontianak"

My movie was inspired by John Boorman¹s "Deliverance" and Peter Weir¹s "Picnic at Hanging Rock." It's essentially an unholy reunion between a mother and child from beyond the grave. The story follows a young Asian American adopted girl named Charity Yamamoto (played by Hiep Thi Le of Oliver Stone¹s "Heaven and Earth") who returns to the place in South East Asia where her birth mother went missing many years ago and was presumed dead on a jungle track. Unwittingly, she brings along four friends whom she met on the Internet, sealing both her fate and theirs, as they confront the unknown forces of Malay voodoo. Bearing in mind that we were shooting on digital video, we wanted to shoot our film NOT "Blair Witch" style. We also concentrated on sound design to bring out the primeval mystery of the jungle.

iR: Why are you attracted B-grade horror films?

Voodoo Child! Effigies of fetus sacrificed for black magic purposes which the film crew stumbled upon!

I think it¹s more the genre itself and the fact that "Pontianak" has been a folklore that I grew up with as a kid. When I was a child, I used to go to my grandma¹s house in a village in the middle of nowhere. We called it the "Ulus." We were always told bedtimes story of "Pontianak" beneath the gas lamp, so I grew up with this story and I thought it would be an interesting thing to tackle. We sort of did our own version of it, a modernized 21st century version of the folklore.

iR: Did you have any filmmaking experience before making your first feature?

I made a short film called "By the Dawn¹s Early Rise" on Super 8 and it won Best Short Film Award in the Singapore International Film Festival 98. Before that, my only other feature film experience was working as a 2nd Assistant Director on Yonfan¹s "Bugis Street."

iR: When did you first get interested in making films?

Back in 1994, when I was 25, I was working as a government civil servant on the Economic Development Board promoting the arts and entertainment industry in Singapore. I decided that it wasn¹t my cup of tea. I just wasn¹t fitting in with my Panama hat. Everyone was talking the talk about making films in Singapore, but no one was doing it. Eric Khoo was almost the only person at that time doing anything at all. After getting a break from working on "Bugis Street," I spent almost a year at the UCLA film extension class. Eric was the one who told me not to spent to much time at film school as he himself went to film school and cultivated nothing but the art of drinking. He told me to spend the money on a short film, which I made and eventually won a prize.

iR: How did you raise the money for "Return to Pontianak"?

Traditional Melanau sickness figures: Smiley, Happy, Sneezy, Grumpy, Sleazy etc.

I was promised to do a bigger film on a similar topic but for a Singaporean producer who said he had the money for it. For six months, I traveled between Canada, Malaysia and Singapore with this guy, but the money never materialized. He said to me one day that he didn¹t have any money for me. The only way he would invest in it was that I shot it on digital video on an extremely low-budget. So I took the bait, and committed to it. And then he didn¹t even come up with his share of the money. So I sank my own money in and started my production as my cast and crew were already in place and set aside the time for it. Later, this guy threatened to bring action against us despite not having seen the script, written the script or contributed any money to it but solely on the claim that he advised us to shoot this digital video "Blair Witch" style. We ignored it and carried on with the filming of the movie, and finished it.

iR: And then what happened?

The skeleton cast & crew on "Return to Pontianak"

We finished shooting it in three weeks, and my bank account was dried up. We tried to look for support in the Singapore "industry," but no one would help us. They did not come through with the small amount of money we were looking for, and the next thing, they were pushing another DV project which was in development. Such is life. We finally found our investors from three young entrepreneurs who were then caught up in the Internet frenzy. This gave us the fuel to finish up post-production. Once we exhausted this money, we had to look for the money to transfer the final digital video output to 35mm. We were looking for about US$35,000 to $50,000, and we were surprised that the big investors wouldn¹t give us a cent. We were stuck for another six months. But we finally got the money from a cabal of Singaporean and Hong Kong business men, and we did the blow-up at CFI Lab in Hollywood.

While we were looking for the transfer money, Shaw Brothers in Singapore called us up and gave us a 3-picture distribution deal based on "Return to Pontianak" and the script for our next project. They are distributing "Return to Pontianak" in Singapore, and it will hit the local screens on June 28, 2001. By the way, we started to whole project back in October 99, and it will have been almost 1 1/2 year after until it hits the screen.

iR: Tell us a bit about the local film market and community in Singapore.

Singapore has the highest per capita film going audience in the world, but unfortunately our population is only a little over 3 million. Because of that, the chances for recouping any decent return on films at the local box office are unusually slim. Average taking at the box office in Singapore is about US$250,000 to $400,000. The exhibitor takes a cut of 55%, and then the distributor takes a further cut of 25% out of the remaining balance, which means that the producers will be lucky to get 33 cents every dollar of the box office. Because of this, Singaporean filmmakers have been forced to find other markets beyond Singapore to exhibit the film. This is very difficult because most Singaporean films are uniquely colloquial.

iR: So how do you see your film fits into this whole scheme of things within and outside Singapore?

We were the first filmmakers in Singapore to shoot on Digital Video to meet this unique Singaporean market. By shooting on mini-DV, we felt that we could reduce the budget of an average Singaporean film from $300,000 U.S. to anywhere near $100,000. This will give us some chance to recoup some money in the local market, and then recoup the rest overseas.

iR: So what¹s happening to the rest of the world for this movie?

We¹re now in the process of learning about distribution the hard way. Since there¹s no foreign sales machinery in place in Singapore to assist local filmmakers, we have to go out peddling our films on our own. I mean literally putting the film in our backpacks and going around the world to get it sold.

"To be honest, I don¹t consider myself a 'director' but a filmmaker."

To be honest, I don¹t consider myself a "director" but a filmmaker. My producers Duncan Jepson and Juan Foo don¹t consider themselves "producers" either, but rather, filmmakers. When people come and ask me, "Are you a director?" I'd say no, because as a director, you only concern yourself with directing the talents and producing the image of the film to such time that you¹ve delivered the film after post. But as a filmmaker, the entire film is your life. I¹ve been living and breathing this film for the past two years. The story doesn¹t end after the premiere of the film. The story ends when we¹ve thoroughly exhausted all possibilities of getting this film sold to every part of the world. I¹m not only concerned with the artistic elements of the film, but also the sales of the film because I have to return the faith of the investors that have put upon me.

For example, with "By the Dawn¹s Early Rise," we¹re very proud that besides winning the award for whatever artistic reason there is, we have managed to recoup our budget of $3,500 U.S. This is especially important to us as Singaporean filmmakers because we don¹t have an industry. And if we do want to grow one, we have to continue to keep our faith with the investors.

"Yes, unfortunately, we are jacks of all trades, and masters of none."

iR: So you¹re quintessentially an independent filmmaker...

Yes, unfortunately, we are jacks of all trades, and masters of none. Or perhaps master of one, film, but barely.

iR: So what¹s next for you?

Currently, we have interest to fund our next feature project "Perth," an homage to "Taxi Driver" and a story about a wife-beater in Singapore. We¹ve also started a company called Vacant Films which is developing projects on a more universal level for a worldwide market as opposed to just local Singaporean projects. To make ends meet, we¹ve been writing a 13-part TV series on soccer for a Singapore TV station.