Shirkers (2018)

A woman explores the events surrounding a film she and her friends began making with a mysterious stranger decades ago.

Director:

Sandi Tan

Writer:

Sandi Tan (a film by)

Stars:

Sandi Tan, Jasmine Kin Kia Ng, Philip Cheah

8 wins & 32 nominations.

Cast

Credited cast:
Sandi Tan	...	Self
Jasmine Kin Kia Ng	...	Self (as Jasmine Ng)
Philip Cheah	...	Self
Sophia Siddique Harvey	...	Self
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Georges Cardona	...	Self (archive footage)
Ben Harrison	...	Self
Grace Dane Mazur	...	Self
Stephen Tyler	...	Self

Storyline

In 1992, teenager Sandi Tan and her friends Sophie and Jasmine shot Singapore's first indie-a road movie called "Shirkers"-with their enigmatic American mentor, Georges Cardona. Sandi wrote the script and played the lead, a killer named S. After shooting wrapped, Georges vanished with all the footage! 20 years later, the 16mm cans are recovered in New Orleans, sending Sandi-now a novelist in Los Angeles-on a new personal odyssey across two continents and many media: 16mm, digital, Hi8, Super8, slides, animation and handwritten letters. A kaleidoscopic punk rock ghost story!

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Plot Keywords:

title directed by female | 

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Genres:

Documentary

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Certificate:

TV-14

Did You Know?

Trivia

In 2018, Sandi Tan premiered her film at the Sundance Film Festival and earned the World Cinema Documentary Directing Award. She was the second Singapore-born filmmaker to win. (The first went to another Tan: Kirsten Tan, for Pop Aye, the previous year.)

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Connections

Features Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979)

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Soundtracks

Mirror
Written and performed by The Venopian Solitude
Courtesy of the artist

User Reviews

Weak 4.5 // Filmmaking as Therapy

Shirkers would have been a 90's Singaporean road movie written by a talented and enthusiastic teenage native, Sandi Tan, produced by her closest friends, and directed by her American mentor, Georges Cardona. Instead, it's a 2018 documentary, fabulously directed by Tan, which tells the story of the would-be film and its ultimate disappearance in the hands of the mysterious Cardona. It's a fascinating yarn that Tan spins beautifully with energetic editing, fluid pacing, and rich imagery. The youthful enthusiasm of Tan and co. paired with the intrigue of the increasingly dark and manipulative Cardona forms the film's surface-level entertainment value. But beyond being simply a great tale well-told, Tan manages to elevate the film by digging below the surface and making tangible its universal themes of nostalgia, friendship, the influence of past over present, and processing psychological trauma. The documentary itself is a wonderful example of the latter, of filmmaking as therapy, and it's to Tan's credit that she was able to make me feel a shred of the catharsis that she must've while making it.

Weak 4.5/5

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

USA UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

26 October 2018 (USA)

Also Known As:

Shirkers

Company Credits

Production Co:

Cinereach, Doc Society, Shirkers

Technical Specs

Runtime:

97 min

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1