A Yellow Bird a Film by K

A YELLOW BIRD A film by K. Rajagopal World Premiere Singapore / France – 2016 – 112 – th HD – 5.1 – 1:1.85 – In Competition at 55 Tamil, Mandarin, English, Hokkien International Critics Week, Cannes Film Festival références PANTONE : références CMJN : TRES IMPORTANT ! Pantone ﬂuo 814 Violet C=55% ; M=60 ; J=0% ; N=0% Lors de changement d’échel du logo pensez à agrandir et/ou réduir proportionnellement le ﬂou gaussien qui est de 12 pix pour le symbole “alpha” et de 8 pix pour le mot “violet”. CREW CAST Director Sivakumar Palakrishnan K. Rajagopal Siva Producers Huang Lu Fran Borgia Chen Chen Claire Lajoumard Seema Biswas Jeremy Chua The mother Screenplay Udaya Soundari Jeremy Chua Krupta (the social worker) K. Rajagopal Nithiyia Rao Cinematography Shanti (the wife) Michael Zaw Indra Chandran Editing Suseela Fran Borgia Sound Justin Loh Roman Dymny Production design James Page – 2 – LOGLINE the address of his ex-wife and daughter. There, he is confronted Siva, a thirty eight year old with a heinous truth. How convicted smuggler, is released far will he go in order to redeem from prison after eight years himself from his guilt? and begins a journey to locate his ex-wife and daughter who DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT have left him without a trace. His quest leads him to a heinous Growing up in multi-racial truth. How far will he go in order Singapore, one is constantly to redeem himself from his guilt? reminded of one’s race – through identity cards, media depictions, education, housing and social SYNOPSIS quotas. These policies that seek to appropriate an individual’s It is an unwelcomed homecoming racial status for racial equality for Siva Sudhakar, a 38 year old and promote tolerance for Singaporean Indian man, who the other, somehow dissolves is released from prison after 8 a collective identity. It is quite years behind bars for contraband instinctive that a Singaporean smuggling. He returns to his primarily identifies himself mother’s flat to learn that by race rather than nationality. his old bedroom has been rented out to migrant workers while My short films have always been his ex-wife and daughter have exploring this voice of the Indian left without a trace. Unable to man in Singapore in a personal find forgiveness from his mother, style of storytelling. I am drawn he begins a quest to locate his to the poetic nature of everyday ex-wife and daughter in order life as an Indian; the liberties, to right the wrongs of his past. oppositions, hopes, fears and An urban vagabond, he finds oppressions. work banging cymbals in a funeral band while he tracks down A Yellow Bird aims to examine people from his life before prison. the position of the “Indian” In his lonely journey, he finds in contemporary Singaporean a kindred spirit – Chen Chen, a society. We form 7 percent hostile Chinese woman on a social of a non-homogeneous local visit who works illegally to earn population that is also made money for her debt-ridden family up of Malays, Eurasians and the back in China. They connect when predominant Chinese. The story one day, Siva defends Chen Chen stems from my own experiences from a lecherous band member as an Indian-Singaporean who tries to take advantage where a sense of belonging of her financial need. Isolated and collective consciousness in their harsh realities, they find to my birth nation is frequently comfort in the presence of one questioned and tested. One another. Just as he begins to question I often encounter find solace and hope, he discovers in my own country is “Where – 3 – are you from?” The Indian person of re-evaluating the state is at times not recognized as in which these migrant workers a Singaporean, but as an outsider. are living in, the government It is common for foreigners have and media attributed the violence the impression that Singapore to abuse of alcohol. To solve belongs to the Chinese and do the problem, an alcoholic ban not see it as a multi-racial country. after 10pm nationwide ensued. Since an industrial and This is the new social condition economic expansion in the facing the main character Siva. 2000s, there has been a greater He returns to society after eight influx of foreign Indian labourers years in prison to discover a new – New Indians, who come to reality where race and identity work in the construction industry. are socio-political and as Just as how the Indians came an ex-convict, he falls into the with the British to construct a new fringes of contemporary society Singapore in the mid-nineteenth where the poor and marginalized century, it seemed that history was live. He has become just repeating itself. A tension between like an immigrant, displaced the New Indians and the local psychologically, spatially and population has emerged out of temporally. In this world of this shift in population boundaries. outsiders, he searches for his ex-wife and daughter who have Singaporeans avoid social left him. There are hints from contact with these migrant the people he encounters that workers. Their dormitories reduce his past crime has damaged their the land value of residential lives. He embarks on this quest zones. Their industrial dirt and not only for redemption and smells are unwelcome on public salvation from those he loves transportation. Their culture and has hurt, but also for a desire and behavior are in many ways for identity and sense of home. misunderstood and mocked. On 8 December 2013, Singapore witnessed its first civil riot in 40 years. Migrant Indian workers rose in anger after an accident killed one of their own on the streets of Little India. Many Singaporeans went to social media to vent their frustration. Using derogative terms against the lower-class migrant population and making xenophobic remarks to the Indian race in general. An immediate parliamentary session raised concerns over public outrage and increasing xenophobia. Instead – 4 – QUESTIONS give him a sense of belonging. Space also controls the other What is the meaning characters. It is an unconscious of the title A Yellow Bird? dictatorial force. For example, the forest is where Chen Chensells The title A Yellow Bird derives her body and hides from the law. from a saying my mother told me as a child. If I saw a yellow Land and space in Singapore, bird, I will soon receive good much like the characters news or meet someone sweet. of the story and their spaces, For me, it represents hope in an are transient. It is the concrete unexpected moment of life. It is world versus the reclaimed almost unreal, you do not know world. The visuals of for sure if it exists. That is why the Singaporean landscape in the film we hardly see a yellow portray the country not bird except one scene where as a commercial modern it is dead. There are also species city but as a small island of birds that would rather kill struggling to find new themselves than live in captivity. space by reclaiming land. Similarly, I question what It is during Siva’s explorations happens when one is forcefully into unmanned territories taken out of his natural habitat? such as the reclaimed shoreline and planted forests where he retreats from the oppression Singapore is often portrayed of the urban spaces to as a bustling modern city yet your find introspection, desires, film mainly takes place in hidden, dreams, identity and ultimately, claustrophobic spaces. What did his destiny. these “other” spaces contribute to your protagonist and his story? Siva’s story is also told through The question of personal space the coming and going of other and the homeland is an important marginalised individuals around motif throughout his journey. him, many living in between right Siva is looking for a utopia. After and wrong. The most poignant being rejected from his mother’s is with Chen Chen where he house, he finds shelter in void begins to find hope. Can you decks and makeshift tents in describe his relationship with her? the forest. Her rejection is parallel to his relationship with the state. I am inspired by the existentialism He does not navigate through depicted in Camus’ L’Étranger modern parts of the city. Instead, as well as Dostoyevsky’s Crime he is drawn to familiar places, and Punishment. The themes nostalgic spaces that have of marginalization, morality and not been taken over by new judgment resonate very strongly developmental projects. Yet the with Siva’s identity as an Indian concrete spaces appear to control ex-convict. He confronts his and imprison him rather than internal conflict of the individual – 5 – versus the society in his the only thing in the world that search for new meaning. still belongs to him, has been In this journey he encounters destroyed by him. He desires an enigmatic Chinese woman, to break her away from Chen Chen, who is an illegal the oppression of the bedroom sex worker and funeral mourner and experience the world trying to earn money for her that she has been locked out family in China. Her issues about from. Even if he has to break illegal status and the economy of the law, he believes that this the body reflect another prevailing is his only salvation for the both tension between Singaporean of them. In this decision, I want Chinese and the New Chinese to push the spectator to look migrants, who are despised beyond the comfort zone; and discriminated for cultural to explore the soul of modern behaviors that are different from society; to challenge the our social norms.

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