SINGAPORE – The 32nd edition of the Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF) will be held in cinemas only, in contrast to last year’s event, which featured physical and online screenings.

The event, which runs from Nov 25 to Dec 5, will feature over 100 films from more than 40 countries. The line-up includes Thai film-maker Apichapong Weerasethakul’s Memoria, which stars Tilda Swinton; and Iranian film-maker Asghar Farhadi’s A Hero, which won the Grand Prix at Cannes. 

The opening film is a black comedy action film from Indonesia, Vengeance Is Mine, All Others Pay Cash (2021), written and directed by Edwin, who goes by one name. In August, at the Locarno Film Festival, it won the top prize of the Golden Leopard for Best Film. It is an Indonesia-Singapore-Germany co-production.

Six cinemas have been named as venues. They are Filmgarde Bugis+, Carnival Cinema at Golden Mile Tower, Golden Village Grand, Oldham Theatre, National Museum of Singapore and Shaw Lido.

Talks and panels will be held at The Arts House and The Projector, with Film Academy sessions held at Lasalle College of the Arts, Nanyang Technological University and Wild Rice.

At a virtual press conference on Oct 26, SGIFF executive director Emily J. Hoe explained that online screenings have been dropped from the programme this year so that festivalgoers can enjoy films “in their fullest form, without distractions”.

“Watching a film in a cinema is very different from how we watch online, so we are thrilled to bring films back to the silver screen.” 
The festival programme will be available online at sgiff.com from Oct 26.

Tickets will be available for sale at this website from Nov 8.

The event marks Mr Thong Kay Wee’s first outing as programme director.

The organisation of the programme has been revamped. Two traditional sections, Asian Vision, showcasing films from the region, and Cinema Today, featuring festival favourites from around the world, have been dropped.

Five new sections have been created to “better profile the films based on the nature of their content”, according to the SGIFF press release.

They include Foreground, for award winners and critically acclaimed works; Milestone, for films which hold a special significance in a film-maker’s career; Standpoint, for films which contain ideas of personal, social and political importance; Undercurrent, for films with “affirm imaginative treatments of the moving image”; and Domain, for films that focus on the activities and knowledge in the realm of cinema.

Mr Thong, speaking at the virtual conference, said that the redesign gives the festival greater flexibility in organising films in “open-ended, boundary-less ways”.

“It allows people to watch films from across regions, from different points of view, and then hopefully allow them to better understand each other,” he added.

The traditional competition sections, the Asian Feature Film Competition and the Southeast-Asian Short Film Competition, will be retained.

Also remaining unchanged is the Singapore Panorama section, which highlights local films. This year, 23 films will be shown, including a newly restored classic from the Cathay-Keris studio, the 1971 comedy Mat Magic starring comedian and actor Mat Sentol.

SGIFF is an event of the Singapore Media Festival (SMF), which is hosted by the Infocomm Media Development Authority of Singapore. The eighth edition of the SMF will be held from Nov 25 to Dec 5 in a hybrid in-person and online format. Its constituent events include Asia TV Forum & Market, ScreenSingapore, VidCon Asia Summit and Singapore Comic Con.