Village People Radio Show R: Amir Muhammad Land: Malaysia 2007 Drehformat: MiniDV Format: Digi Beta PAL, Farbe Länge: 72 Minuten Sprache: Malaiisch, Thai mehr Informationen  |  zur Filmseite TRAILER / Windows Media / 1:15 / 2,0 MB

Amir Muhammad setzt sich, wie schon zuvor in seinem Film "Lelaki komunis terakhir" (The Last Communist) mit der Geschichte der Kommunistischen Partei Malaysias auseinander. Trotz ihrer Beteiligung am Kampf um die Unabhängigkeit des Landes wurde der Partei stets ihre Verbundenheit mit China vorgeworfen und ihre atheistische Philosophie in einem muslimisch dominierten Land. Die Erinnerungen der Protagonisten werden nicht mit Archivmaterial bebildert. Stattdessen sehen wir die Männer in ihrem Dorf, das in strahlend klaren, mitunter statischen Bildern gezeigt wird. Durch die Brechung der Erzählungen versucht Muhammad der Wirklichkeit näher zu kommen. [aus dem Forumprogramm]

We were told your film was shot on something called "minion". Actually none of us here has ever heard of a video format called minion -- what is it? From your production jpg's we'd say you used the panasonic HVX200 and shot on HDV. Where does minion come into the picture?
What on earth is minion?? I never wrote it anywhere. Unless my handwriting on the official form is really bad... We used Panasonic AGDVX102A, minidv, progressive.

Last year you said to have shot your film on DVcam, "because that was the nicest among my friends' cameras that I could use for free". Have you found new friends with better cameras since?
This time we rented a camera from an enterprising bloke called Kok Kai Foong. By coincidence he is attending the Talent Campus this year!

Village People Radio Show seems to deal with the same subject as The last Communist. Is it similar in style, too? Are there any musical scenes in this film also? Does it stand for itself or is it "part 2"?
It's quite different in style. We used locked camera positions like we were on a James Benning shoot. And the picture breaks up into Brakhagian digital interruptions. (These are of course two directors who famously did/does not use video). There are no songs but a Thai radio soap opera randomly intrudes. Quite trippy. This time we stay put in one village rather than travel all over the place, so the style needed to reflect that. I think it can stand alone, but who am I to judge?.


see also the Interview with Amir Muhammad on The Last Communist (2006)