SINGAPORE - Ask Singapore film-maker Anthony Chen what it was like to make his English-language feature film debut with a cast that includes the Oscar-nominated English actress-singer Cynthia Erivo, and he will remind you that Drift is a modestly budgeted movie which happens to have a big name in it.
“In Singapore, I could shoot 12 hours a day. In Greece, I was shooting 10 hours a day, Mondays to Fridays, even though we had to get through so much material. We averaged three takes. The maximum was about five,” he adds. Film-maker Anthony Chen on the set of Drift, which was shot in Greece. PHOTO: COURTESY OF GIRAFFE PICTURES
The trade-off for the peace and quiet was that most businesses, such as small restaurants known as tavernas, were shuttered then. He, his risk analyst wife Rachel Yan and their son Ethan, now 5½, moved from London to Hong Kong in 2022 because she had been transferred there. The Chen family will be based there for the next few years, he adds.
Chen’s first feature, a family drama about a Filipina domestic helper and her relationship with her Singaporean employers – in particular the son played by Koh Jia Ler and the mother played by Yeo Yann Yann – made the film-maker the first Singaporean to win the Camera d’Or award at the Cannes Film Festival.
Filmed in China and featuring a cast of Chinese actors, Chen once again approached the topic of outsiderhood and belonging, this time with three young adult characters played by Zhou Dongyu, Liu Haoran and Qu Chuxiao.