Filmmaker digs up Singapore's forgotten past

By Wee Sui Lee

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Faded footage of people in motor-powered sampans flickers and crackles on the screen. Mangrove swamps fill the landscape. It is Singapore in the 1950s.

These flashbacks from a bygone era are seen in "Invisible City," a one-hour documentary featuring people in search of Singapore's past by local filmmaker Tan Pin Pin.

"This film isn't about Singapore per se -- it is about memories, the need to be remembered and what one does to be remembered," Tan, 38, told Reuters in her studio in Little India.

"I think I made a documentary that mourns the passing of time."

The film, which premieres in Singapore on July 19, comes at a time when locals are criticizing the government for wiping out the heritage of the city-state, as British colonial villas and 19th-century Chinese shophouses are razed to make room for development.

Indeed, the sense of loss in the pursuit of progress is a common theme in most of Tan's films.

Many viewers feel that beneath her tender and thoughtful portrayal of Singapore lies a veiled critique of the administration -- something she denies.

But one issue that Tan, a law graduate from Britain's Oxford University, is vocal about is censorship -- a problem affecting many filmmakers here.

One of Tan's films, a three-minute piece called "Lurve Me Now" that explores the fantasies of Barbie dolls, was banned in 1998 by the censors for its sexual references.

In 2005, she represented a group of 10 filmmakers who sought to clarify laws on political films after police questioned the director of a film about an opposition leader.

But Tan said not much has changed since then.

"It's still as untransparent. It has always been and I think it will continue to be."

While Singapore has been trying to encourage a homegrown film and media industry, the city-state's Films Act bars the making and distribution of "party political films" -- an offence punishable with a maximum fine of S$100,000 ($65,320) or up to two years in prison.

MELANCHOLIC IMAGE

In a brief preview of "Invisible City" shown exclusively to Reuters, a group of young archaeologists discover an abandoned fort at Sentosa, an island where one of two Singapore's casinos will be located.