Film
The Cambodian Space Project: Not Easy Rock 'n' Roll
The Cambodian Space Project: Not Easy Rock 'n' Roll is a 2015 documentary by Marc Eberle about the Phnom Penh band The Cambodian Space Project.[1] The band formed after Australian musician Julien Poulson heard singer Srey Thy in a Phnom Penh karaoke bar in 2009.[2]
Synopsis
Srey Thy, also known as Kak Channthy, grew up poor in a Cambodian village, and Poulson heard her singing karaoke in a Phnom Penh bar.[2][3] Their meeting led to a stormy cross-cultural romance and to the band, which plays songs from the 1960s and 1970s golden age of Cambodian rock.[2] Srey Thy sings 1960s Khmer standards along with her own mixes, blending Cambodian pop with later Western rock.[3] The film follows the band from bars in Phnom Penh to music clubs in Sydney, Paris and Hong Kong, and on to sold-out rock venues in Berlin.[4][5]
The documentary places the band within the revival of Cambodian rock, whose music and film scenes stopped abruptly when the Khmer Rouge took power in 1975.[4] Srey Thy's major vocal influence is the singer Pan Ron, and the veteran actress Dy Saveth appears to give her advice.[4] It includes the band's performance at the Cambodia International Film Festival as live accompaniment to Georges Méliès's 1902 film A Trip to the Moon, and animated sequences by Eberle that picture Srey Thy as an actress in an Angkorian science fiction epic.[4] Across five years of filming, it tells the story of performers struggling to overcome poverty, trauma and obscurity.[1]
Production and credits
Marc Eberle, a German filmmaker, directed the film and produced it with the Australian producer Richard Kuipers.[1][5] Angus Macqueen and Sharyn Prentice were executive producers.[2] Ronachan Films and Flaming Star Films produced it.[1] The Cambodia Film Commission lists it as an Australia and Cambodia production, while IMDb lists Australia and the United Kingdom.[1][6] Shot partly in Phnom Penh, it runs 75 minutes, in Khmer and English.[6][1] The Bophana Audiovisual Resource Center holds a copy with a Khmer dub.[7]
Release and reception
The film premiered at the Sydney Film Festival on June 6, 2015, the release date the Cambodia Film Commission records.[8][1][9] The Diplomat wrote that it premiered in Phnom Penh at the Cambodian International Film Festival, with Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and James Gerrand in the audience, and that it earned a standing ovation from a packed house there.[3][10] Audiences at the Luang Prabang Film Festival gave it the festival's first Audience Award.[4]
The 2016 Cambodia Town Film Festival selected the film and gave it its Long Beach premiere on September 3, 2016, screened in Khmer with English subtitles.[2] Kak Channthy died in a car crash in 2018, at age 38.[8]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 Cambodia Film Commission, The Cambodian Space Project: Not Easy Rock'n'Roll (2019)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Cambodia Town Film Festival, CTFF 2016 Official Selection: The Cambodian Space Project: Not Easy Rock 'n' Roll (archived)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 The Diplomat, Why Angelina Jolie's New Cambodia Movie Matters (February 2017)
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 Cambodia unclassified (December 27, 2015)
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 The Diplomat, Taking off: The Cambodian Space Project (January 8, 2016)
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 IMDb, The Cambodian Space Project: Not Easy Rock'n'Roll (2015)
- ↑ Bophana Audiovisual Resource Center, The Cambodian Space Project: Not Easy Rock 'n' Roll catalog record
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 Los Angeles Times, Singer-songwriter Kak Channthy dies in car crash at 38 (March 25, 2018)
- ↑ IMDb, The Cambodian Space Project: Not Easy Rock'n'Roll, release info
- ↑ The Diplomat, Remembering Cambodia Rock Star Kak Channthy (March 23, 2018)