Film
Tenement (film)
Tenement (អ្នកស្នងអគារ, "The Heir of the building") is a 2024 Cambodian horror film directed by Inrasothythep Neth and Sokyou Chea.[1][2] A manga artist moves into her late mother's apartment building and finds its residents preparing a new host for an evil spirit.[2]
Synopsis
Soriya is a Cambodian manga artist living in Japan.[1] After her mother's death, she pitches a horror manga to her editor so she can travel to Phnom Penh, the city her mother fled, and she goes with her boyfriend, Daichi.[1][2] She reunites with family she has never known and rents a room in the rundown housing complex from the Khmer Rouge era where her mother once lived.[1][3] As she looks into her mother's past, strange events unfold in the building.[2] The residents' warm attention to the newcomers turns out to be part of a ritual: they are preparing a new host for the building's evil spirit before it starts killing them again.[2] In the view of SIFF, Cambodia's political past and genocide resonate through the building's peeling walls and dark spaces.[1]
Production and credits
Neth and Chea wrote the screenplay, and the film is the feature directing debut for both.[2][4] Neth has directed music videos, television commercials, web series and short films since 2015; his shorts The Dinner and Before the Rain won Best Short Film at the Chaktomuk Short Film Festival in 2017 and 2019.[2] Chea's first fiction short, សេះហោះ (The Ride, 2013), was a finalist at Tropfest SEA 2013, and her feature project Soul Searching won the Bucheon Award at the Network of Asia Fantastic Film project market in 2018.[2][1]
Loy Te produced the film and edited it, with Kongchak Pictures, Spanic Films and Westec Media Limited among the production companies.[1][4] Jeremiah Overman shot it and Jean-Charles Bastion wrote the music.[1] Thanet Thorn plays Soriya and Yoshihiko Hosoda plays Daichi, with Socheata Sveng, Mony Rous and Katsuya Maiguma in the principal cast.[1] Filming began in 2020 but stopped for two years during the COVID-19 pandemic, and most of it took place in Tokyo and Cambodia.[4] The film is a Cambodia and Japan collaboration, in Khmer, English and Japanese.[4][1]
The production paid close attention to sound to build an immersive atmosphere, and the Institut Français du Cambodge called Tenement the first Cambodian film mixed in Dolby Atmos.[3][4] Running times differ: 85 minutes at the Cambodia Town Film Festival, 84 minutes at SIFF, and 88 minutes at the Institut Français du Cambodge.[2][1][3]
Release and reception
The film had its world premiere in the Big Screen Competition at the 2024 International Film Festival Rotterdam, and it also screened at the Osaka Asian Film Festival in March 2024.[4] It went on to festivals in Kuala Lumpur, Perth, Bucheon, Sitges and Lisbon, and SIFF gave it its North American premiere.[3][1] At the 2024 Cambodia Town Film Festival, it screened at the Art Theatre in Long Beach on September 15, 2024, and won Best Feature Film.[2][5] It received the Best Production Design award at the 2024 Ho Chi Minh City Film Festival.[3][4]
Tenement opened in Cambodian theaters on November 14, 2024.[4][3] In France it was released on the Shadowz streaming service on February 28, 2025.[6]
References
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 SIFF, Tenement (2024)
- ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 Cambodia Town Film Festival, CTFF 2024 Official Selection: tenement (archived)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 Institut Français du Cambodge, Tenement (November 13, 2024)
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 Wikipedia, Tenement (2024 film)
- ↑ IMDb, Cambodia Town Film Festival (2024)
- ↑ AlloCiné, Tenement (2025)