Film
A Cambodian Spring
A Cambodian Spring is a documentary by Chris Kelly about three people caught up in Cambodia's land-rights protests.[1] It was shot over six years and won Best Documentary at the 2017 Cambodia Town Film Festival.[2]
Synopsis
The film follows opposition to a plan to develop Boeung Kak Lake in Phnom Penh.[3] The plan threatened the families who lived around the lake with eviction.[3] The Buddhist monk Venerable Luon Sovath and the housing activists Toul Srey Pov and Tep Vanny led the protests and are the film's central figures.[3][4] The film charts the growing wave of land-rights protests that led to the "Cambodian Spring," which began in 2013, and the events that followed.[2][5]
Production and credits
Kelly directed, produced and filmed the documentary in Cambodia.[3][6] Edwina Forkin and Christopher Hird were executive producers.[6] The film was produced through Dartmouth Films, Eye Steel Film, Little Ease Films and Zanzibar Films.[3] It is in Khmer with English subtitles and runs 121 minutes.[1] Kelly calls it a deeply personal film that took nine years to complete.[7]
Release and reception
The film premiered at Sheffield DocFest in 2016 under the title The Cause of Progress.[3] Its makers date its world premiere to the Hot Docs festival in Toronto in May 2017.[7] There it won the Special Jury Prize for International Feature Documentary.[1] The film had its West Coast premiere at the Cambodia Town Film Festival at the Art Theatre in Long Beach on September 17, 2017, followed by a question-and-answer session with Luon Sovath and Kelly.[1] It won the festival's Best Documentary award that year.[2]
It received a theatrical release in the United Kingdom and Ireland on May 18, 2018.[3] The film was a SIMA Awards finalist in 2018.[8] It was nominated for Outstanding British Debut at the 2019 BAFTA Awards.[3] The film's own site lists a BAFTA for Outstanding British Debut and an IFTA for Best Documentary among its awards.[7] In Time Out, Phil de Semlyen wrote that "for all its sombre revelations, 'A Cambodian Spring' exudes a powerful sense of possibility."[6]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Cambodia Town Film Festival, CTFF 2017 Official Selection: A CAMBODIAN SPRING (archived)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Cambodia Town Film Festival, CTFF 2017 BEST DOCUMENTARY: A CAMBODIAN SPRING (archived)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7 Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., A Cambodian Spring - Wikipedia (2019-02-08)
- ↑ IMDb, A Cambodian Spring (2016)
- ↑ Dartmouth Films, A Cambodian Spring
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Rotten Tomatoes, A Cambodian Spring
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 A Cambodian Spring, About
- ↑ SIMA Studios, A CAMBODIAN SPRING