From November 26 to December 7, the Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF) returns for its 36th run. With 121 films from 45 countries screening across Singapore, there are plenty of films to choose from. Tickets are already on sale (and yes, you can use your Culture Pass for eligible films).
This year, the festival opens with actress Shu Qi’s directorial debut: a semi-autobiographical film about a young girl growing up in ‘80s Taipei. In honour of the festival’s opening film (aptly titled Girl), film programmer Vess Chua has 10 films and short films about girlhood that you should catch at SGIFF.
There’s one for every female movie archetype: from stories of eldest daughters, to female rage, to tragic female friendships (and situationships). Scroll on for her curation of films from a female gaze.
Vess Chua is a film programmer based between Bangkok and Singapore. She programmes for the Singapore International Film Festival and serves on viewing committees for Movies That Matter (NL) and Montreal International Documentary Festival (CA). Previously, she worked with the Singapore Youth Film Festival and the Perspectives Film Festival. She is drawn to films exploring speculative histories, collective anxieties, and resistance in Southeast Asian cinema.
Shape of Momo
“The flipside of girlhood is that sinking gut feeling when you realise escape was temporary. Bishu leaves Delhi for her Sikkimese village and walks straight into the same expectations her mother and grandmother faced, to be feminine, find a husband, and make perfect momos. Perhaps it’s comforting to know that Shape of Momo understands what it’s like to be an exhausted daughter.”
When: December 6, 9pm & December 7, 2pm
Sound of Falling
“A German farmhouse bears quiet witness to the lives of four girls unravelling across a century in Mascha Schilinski’s Cannes Jury Prize winner. Sound of Falling might not have the cure to generational trauma, but it is an unflinching reminder of how it repeats itself – same house, same violence, different girls thinking this time it will be different. At least the cinematography is *chef’s kiss* gorgeous.”
When: November 30, 10.30am & December 1, 4.30pm
The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo
“Sometimes it feels like the world is punishing you for just existing as you truly are, that is the reality of 11-year-old Lidia growing up in 1980s Chile. Her loving queer family is being blamed for a mysterious illness allegedly spread through a single gaze, a poignant AIDS-era allegory. Like avenging angels in the dust, survival means fighting back. It’s going to take me a while to emotionally recover from this Travesti-Western.”
When: December 2, 9.30pm
Vanilla
“Eight-year-old Roberta navigates the world surrounded by her all-female, big multi-generational family. Her innocence is shattered when she realises that her family might lose their home amid growing debt. Vanilla depicts many messy, flawed women, all stumbling through life for the first time, different ages but same precarity. They’re all just girls together.”
When: December 3, 4.30pm
Amoeba
“When we talk about girlhood, we must also acknowledge all its feral intensities. In Amoeba, female friendships can be both salvation and suffocation. Your best friends can feel like home until one day, they simply don’t. Having spent 10 years in an all-girls school myself, this one hit uncomfortably close to home. It’s time to revive the girl’s group chat and catch Amoeba at SGIFF.”
When: November 29, 7.30pm & December 1, 7pm
Lesbian Space Princess
“Princess Saira of Planet Clitropolis goes on an inter-gay-lactic quest to save her ex-girlfriend from the Straight White Maliens (yes, you read that right!). Writer-directors Emma Hough Hobbs and Leela Verghese’s candy-coloured, gloriously unhinged film refuses the lie that big feelings make you unlovable. Lesbian Space Princess says you’re enough as you are, no apologies needed.”
When: November 29, 4.30pm
Southeast Asian Short Film Competition Programme 1: Children’s Day
“Timid eight-year-old Xuan just wants the perfect outfit to wear to school for Children’s Day, but her family’s cruelty makes that impossible. At school, she befriends a kind and beautiful classmate, an image of who she wishes she was. For the girls who look back at their childhood and remember those days of feeling small and insignificant, and of wanting to be loved, Director Giselle Lin sees you.””
When: December 4, 9.30pm
Southeast Asian Short Film Competition Programme 2: Hour of the Flower
“For nine-year-old neurodivergent May, the millennium apocalypse and her first period arrive at the same time, and honestly, who’s to say which one’s scarier? Director Grace Song understands that for some, catastrophes don’t exist on different scales, they burden with the same crushing weight.”
When: December 5, 7pm
Singapore Panorama Programme 1: Full Month
“Jing drags herself back to Singapore for her niece’s first month celebration, determined to play the model twenty-something Singaporean daughter to appease her family. Spoiler alert: she immediately remembers why she left. If family obligation feels like love and resentment strangling you in equal measure, Full Month gets it and might make you feel slightly less alone about it.””
When: November 29, 2pm
Singapore Panorama Programme 4: Rasa Sayang
“If you learnt about desire and shame in the same breath, Rasa Sayang is your repressed youth coming back to haunt you – literally. Teenage Mei hides her sexuality while hooking up with classmate J (no feelings because feelings make it real and real makes it dangerous) until she meets Lina, a mesmerising Pontianak. Director Marie Ee externalises what queer girlhood feels like: wanting something so badly it feels monstrous, forbidden, and capable of swallowing you whole.”
When: November 30, 4.30pm