Director Yeo Siew Hua’s new film, Stranger Eyes, has been selected as Singapore’s official submission for the Best International Feature Film category at the ninety-eighth Academy Awards. The announcement comes after the film had its debut at last year’s Venice Film Festival, where it was the first Singaporean production to be chosen for the main competition.
The film, a co-production between Singapore, Taiwan, France, and the United States, is a psychological drama that explores themes of surveillance, grief, and identity. Its story is centred on a young couple whose lives are upended after they receive a series of mysterious videos while investigating the disappearance of their baby daughter.
The videos show that someone has been covertly filming their lives, including their most intimate moments. As the police set up surveillance, family secrets begin to unravel under the weight of the scrutiny.
For Yeo Siew Hua, the film’s selection for the Academy Awards is a particularly meaningful one. The director first conceived of the idea for Stranger Eyes more than ten years ago, but he and producer Fran Borgia encountered several “dead ends” with funding.
This led them to set the project aside and work on another film, “A Land Imagined,” which went on to win a Golden Leopard at Locarno and was Singapore’s Oscar submission in 2018.
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Following the success of that film, Yeo was able to return to the project. He said, “After A Land Imagined garnered success, we decided to re-look at Stranger Eyes.” This time, he noted, funding came “a lot easier.” He developed the film through various international labs from 2016 to 2022, including the Southeast Asia Fiction Film Lab and Produire au Sud.
A Multinational Production
Stranger Eyes features a Taiwanese ensemble cast that includes the actor-director Lee Kang-Sheng, Wu Chien-Ho, Annica Panna, and Vera Chen. The film also features appearances by the Malaysian actor Pete Teo and the Singaporean actress Xenia Tan.
The film’s producer, Fran Borgia, reflected on the long journey to this moment. “We started developing ‘Stranger Eyes’ 10 years ago and couldn’t have achieved this great privilege to be Singapore’s Oscars representative without the belief and support of the IMDA and SFC as well as our coproduction partners,” Borgia said. “We’re proud that a multinational film like ‘Stranger Eyes,’ reflecting Singapore’s precious diversity, can showcase our nation’s plurality on the world stage.”
The Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) and Singapore Film Commission provided support for the production, which has screened in over ten territories. Yvonne Tang, an assistant chief executive at IMDA, highlighted the film’s international reach, noting it “reflects the growing strength of Made-with-Singapore productions” on the global stage.
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Yeo Siew Hua, for his part, expressed gratitude for the opportunity. “It’s a real honor to represent Singapore again for a second time since my previous film,” he said. “It is important to keep our stories alive and to continue to tell stories that matter.”
