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Xin Ke: The Story Of Singapore And Malaya’s First Feature Film

$20.00

In 1926, an enterprising young man enthusiastically brought into Singapore the idea of showcasing the life of the people in British Malaya – by way of a movie. His name was Liu Beijin. The uncle of the eminent local artist Liu Kang, the former Muar resident set up an office in Chinatown and a film studio in Katong, hired his crew and cast members, and began production. The result was Xin Ke, a full-length silent film, released in 1927, about a young Chinese immigrant who seeks his fortunes in Malaya. Assisted by his wealthy Peranakan relatives, he eventually finds a job in Singapore – and a girl he loves. In this bilingual book, film researchers Jan Uhde, Yvonne Ng Uhde and Toh Hun Ping travel back in time to the beginning of film production in Singapore. Reproducing the original movie script in full, accompanied by finely drawn illustrations by Dan Wong, this book is a much-needed addition to our film industry’s collective memory.


About Yvonne Ng Uhde 

Yvonne Ng Uhde is an independent film researcher. She has contributed numerous essays and opinion pieces to books and periodicals in Canada, the United States, Europe, and Singapore. She is the co-author of Latent Images: Film in Singapore.

About Jan Uhde
Jan Uhde is Professor Emeritus (Film Studies) at the University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. He founded a Bachelor’s programme in Film Studies at the Department of Fine Arts, where he taught for over four decades. He wrote Vision and Persistence: Twenty Years of the Ontario Film Institute and co-wrote Latent Images: Film in Singapore.

About Toh Hun PIng
Toh Hun PIng is a visual artist, filmmaker and film researcher. He has developed video works and short films involving various forms of image manipulation. His works have been screened at international experimental film festivals. He also runs the Singapore Film Locations Archive, a video collection of films made in Singapore.

About Lucien Low
Lucien Low is a bilingual translation editor with postgraduate qualifications in both publishing and English/Chinese translation. He recently edited the Chinese translation in The Little Red Dot and co-edited Great Lengths: Singapore’s Swimming Pools.

About Jocelyn Lau
Jocelyn Lau is an editor with postgraduate qualifications in publishing. She draws on 20 years’ experience in managing and editing a broad range of genres, including academic texts, coffee table books, travel guides, fiction titles and magazines. She edited Latent Images: Film in Singapore (Oxford University Press) in 2000.

About Dan Wong
Dan Wong is a commercial illustrator and digital artist. His personal art is centred heavily on social, political and cultural affairs. He heads the art collective A Good Citizen. Together with fellow illustrators Brenna Tan, Kimberly Teo, Su Qin and Melinda Chong, Wong produced the drawings in this book.

2 in stock

SKU: 1184 Categories: ,

 

BY Yvonne Ng Uhde and Jan Uhde
EDITED BY Toh Hun Ping, Lucien Low, and Jocelyn Lau
ILLUSTRATED BY Dan Wong
YEAR 2019
DETAILS Softcover, 222pp

21 x 17 cm

LANGUAGE English and Mandarin

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