Featuring four films in late production stage, the showcase is highly necessary, argues its curator, Gugi Gumilang, the executive director of In-Docs, the non-profit org behind Docs by the Sea.
So the Cannes showcase is a unique and welcome opportunity to bring to attention to up-and-coming Asian documentary talent at the world’s biggest film market. “I wanted to show the existence of this indigenous way of life because a part of me was enraged with how Indonesia has become intolerant and unaccepting in recent years with regulation that is harmful to marginalized groups, especially the LGBTQ+ community,” she tells She adds: “There is a universal message in this story: the ache to be accepted. That at some point – without realizing – we all must have conformed in order to be a part of something.
Produced by Alemberg Ang , Tan Si En , Yasmin Rams , Chan Sze-Wei , and executive produced by Derren Lawfod and Daniel Karslake , the film is set for release in early 2024.Shot over six years, the film tells the story of a single mother’s journey of resilience and her struggle to rebuild her life on ancestral land in northeastern Cambodia after her village is flooded by a hydroelectric dam.