A Dream I Did Not Dream

An emotive anthology by seven of Singapore's most illustrious filmmakers, celebrating SG50 through the lives and stories of Singaporeans. Directed by Eric Khoo, Jack Neo, K. Rajagopal, Royston Tan, Tan Pin Pin, Boo Junfeng, Kelvin Tong.

Seven young directors from Singapore produce a cinematic cadavre exquis.

Rosie Wong, a blind woman, shares a retrospective account about the three lives which shaped her life. Taking inspiration from ‘The Giving Tree’, her life is significantly changed by a kind stranger, Pak Cik Tubi Moh Salleh, who helped her get to work everyday for 5 years. Pak Cik Tubi continued this good deed for the next few years, tirelessly helping Madam Rosie.

Paul and Anita who are in a long-distance relationship are finally back together. But how do they manage their desires while in quarantine when they have to keep a safe distance from each other?

Sean and Meera meet in the supermarket during Circuit Breaker and begin a charged romance one metre apart from each other. But what happens to the young couple when the Circuit Breaker un-trips?

A father obliges a young boy and takes him to watch movies at New World, Singapore’s iconic entertainment venue of the 1960s and 1970s. The boy is enthralled, growing up on a gamut of film genres. He loves both the comedies and tragedies. He laughs and cries with the characters, experiencing their joys and sorrows, and even falling in love with some of them. The line between reality and flimsy film is marred even, when unwittingly he allows a merging of his life with what goes on in the film world. Oblivious to the real world at times, he is forced to face harsh reality with the unexpected death of his father. Distraught, his escape into his make-believe world also ends suddenly when he stops watching films at the New World.

It is an unwelcome homecoming for Siva, a Singaporean-Indian ex-convict, haunted by a tragedy in his past. Released after eight years behind bars and dejected by his mother’s coldness, he leaves home in search of his ex-wife and daughter. His old friend denies any knowledge of their whereabouts and instead leads him back into crime. Finding him sheltering in ‘void decks’ (the open public access corridors found beneath government-built residential housing in Singapore), the police force him to meet with a social worker; a woman also dealing with her own fears.

Inspired by the first English-language novel "Inheritance" of acclaimed Singaporean novelist Balli Kaur Jaswal about Singapore's Punjabi-Sikh diaspora, the film surrounds the story of a Punjabi family and the characters' struggles against traditions and belonging. The project involves the local Punjabi community, who has often been left out of the larger Singaporean narrative even when they are such an important part of our cultural landscape.

This is a love story adapted from JM Sali’s tale of an Indian man who meets and falls in love with a Chinese woman in Singapore by chance, but she discovers that he is actually married back home in India. Told from the perspective of the writer—who is played by more than one actor, and who also plays the character—the film blurs the lines between roles, reality, time and space. The words and text of the writer also interplay with the sound of silence and the actions of the actors and characters.

Minah left before Rizal could say goodbye. The distance between them is vast, but can their love transcend space and time?