WHAT needs to be done to propel the local film industry to greater heights?
That is the question National Film Development Corporation Malaysia (Finas) chairman Datuk Kamil Othman is now trying to answer.
The 68-year-old has his work cut out for him.
For every Malaysian film garnering attention on the international circuit, there are many more that are barely remembered even by locals.
That is not to mention the lamentable domestic box office performance by most local films, even those which are critically praised internationally.
These are long-standing issues in the industry – they’ve been around since the establishment of Finas in 1980 when the body was tasked with developing the local film industry.
“You cannot get a definition broader than that, right? It’s about the film industry,” Kamil says.
But 40-odd years on, what do people think when Finas is mentioned?
They think Finas is just there to provide funding to those in the film industry and resolve any issues that arise in the filmmaking process, he says. Then there are those who point their finger at the agency every time a “film censorship controversy” blows up.
“Anything goes wrong, it’s Finas. If a producer cheats a director or does not pay the actors, Finas. A lorry crashes into a set, Finas. Someone wants financial aid to go to the Lee Strasberg school of acting, Finas.”
However, the real function of Finas extends beyond all that and Kamil wants to shift the focus to aim for something bigger for the local film industry.
“At the end of the day, I love cinema but I also know the financial aspect.
“The bigger picture is to turn the film industry into a high economic growth area.”
The economic potential of the film industry is huge; in 2023, total earnings at the box office in the United States and Canada alone amounted to almost US$9bil (RM42bil).
But the power of the film industry goes beyond direct commercial interests.
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Kamil points to the soft power that can be deployed through the creative arts industry.
“We want to have a new wave of Malaysian cinema so that someone in New York sees a Malaysian film and the next day buys a Proton Saga, or someone watches a film in Tokyo and suddenly searches for a Malaysian restaurant.”
How can Malaysia capitalise on this?
New communities
First things first, Kamil says there needs to be a more holistic approach to supporting filmmakers.
Times have changed since the 1980s and along with it, filmmaking too. Movies are no longer shot on film and accessibility to a wider variety of films became easier due to the rise of the digital era. Malaysian filmmakers have also started realising the beauty and diversity of “human interest” films.
“All that combined made a new generation of people who see films in a slightly different way from previous generations,” Kamil says.
This has led to what Kamil describes as new communities of filmmakers who eschew the conservative, traditional thinking of making big, star-studded commercial films like those made during the golden age of the Shaw Brothers and the Cathay-Keris film studios.
Changes: Filmmaking technology has changed, with many movies no longer shot on film, and accessibility to a wider variety of films becoming easier due to the rise of the digital era. — Finas
However, the issue of financing movies has largely remained the same.
The film industry in Malaysia in general has been subsidised through Finas grants for so long that Kamil says it is difficult to “force an entrepreneurial mindset” on filmmakers.
“The grant system is only a support. It was never meant as financing. But I think along the way, some may have mistaken it for financing.”
There have also been complaints that Finas grants are sometimes given to movies that may not be deserving of them.
Last year, social media erupted over partly Finas-funded local film Vik2ria Secret with a budget of over RM1mil that only earned about RM5,000 at the box office.
While Finas has a team that conducts postmortems on films that are not as successful as they should have been, Kamil says the way the organisation grants funding has changed.
Instead of relying on the producers’ pitch, Finas is now looking at film scripts first before agreeing to provide grants, he says.
“Let the story mature. Give the grant where a script can go to a [script] lab. For months, writers will be meeting with their peers, from which they can learn a lot of things, but most importantly, they learn about when the film is ready. And when they come back to us, we know the film has ‘matured’.”
Making connections
The new generation of filmmakers has also learned to be more independent when it comes to sourcing funds for their movies.
They have their own network of contacts to help with funding, and Finas is trying to encourage this culture of networking in more local filmmakers.
They have held talks at which filmmakers can learn about how they can get their films made from success stories, like Amanda Nell Eu whose first film Tiger Stripes received funding from Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan and Singapore.
Amanda Nell Eu's film 'Tiger Stripes' received funding from Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan and Singapore.
Aside from that, Finas is now trying to connect filmmakers with potential investors by bringing exhibitors, broadcasters, distributors and sales agents into meetings with filmmakers.
“It’s the ability to now be shown at festivals and indirectly giving sort of a focus on our directors and producers who then might be of interest to a producer in Europe, Japan or South Korea.
“We are putting our creme de la creme out and connecting them.”
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Just like the peak of the Shaw Brothers and Cathay-Keris film studios era, Kamil says he is thinking of the film industry as the business that it is.
Another aspect of the business of filmmaking is the paying audience.
Unfortunately, Kamil says our education system does not value the arts so much.
“In other words, we are not a ‘clapping culture’. We do not see a busker performing and clap naturally like the way people in some countries do.”
Finas is doing what it can to build film literacy among Malaysians by starting a film appreciation club.
Recently, he says, Finas managed to track down and screen one of the most sought-after cult films in Malaysia, Johnny Bikin Filem (1995). His team is on the lookout for other cult classics such as Johnny Surabaya (1990) to attract more people to the club.
“This is where we can’t do much other than hope and create a lot of awareness,” he laments.
It was a coup for Finas to rediscover the lost film, Johnny Bikin Filem. — Recopy
Continuity issues
Kamil concedes that there is a lot that needs to be done to fulfil his vision for the Malaysian film industry moving forward.
But with only a two-year term as Finas chairman, he also has to contemplate issues of continuity. After all, this is not Kamil’s first time in Finas; he was the Finas director from 2014 to 2016.
“Before I retired then, I already recognised [all these issues in the industry]. So that’s why the seeds for the support system were all planted at the time, but two years hardly allows you to see what you have planted become a tree,” he notes.
“And that’s why I think I had some problems because after me, somehow the continuity didn’t happen.
“I am not lobbying here for 10 years in Finas. What I’m saying is there is a need for continuity, even if there is a handover, that is very important.”
