Forum Lenteng

After over a decade in prison, little trace of filmmaker and member of the leading Communist cultural movement Bachtiar Siagian’s life and work could be found, but Hafiz Rancajale still searched. Alongside his colleagues, they revise his mis-slandered history.

This film tries to read the idea of film archiving in the mind of Misbach Yusa Biran. A character who gave his entire life to preserve and reinterpret the discourse of film as a source of Indonesian film history. The archives stored are entirely in Sinematek Indonesia.

A small story from the border of Tangerang Regency and Bogor Regency. It was there that Kang Sui Liong, the temple guard, lived with his wife and children.

This public transport has many story in it. Ukar, the taxi driver told what happen when you drive and meet the strangers. The conversation become really a hero story as Ukar as an actor. And it stop when the rain comes and the wiper cleaning. You can guess which one the truth.

A story of the sacrifice of farmers in defending their land from the mining permit given by the local government to a big company in the district of Lambu.

A piece of story which has been taken from two young men from Rangkasbitung – it’s a small town which has a distance 120 kilometers from the capital city of Jakarta. Kiwong and Iron have a profession as a tofu sellers. Kiwong sells tofu in the economy train of Rangkasbitung to Jakarta while Iron sells the fresh tofu in the traditional Rangkasbitung market. Those characters are portraits of young generation from post Reformation in 1998 where Indonesia was a country which had been reigned by military regime before, and turn to be a large democratic country in the world.

New cosmopolitanism started with the bromocorah’s (free agent) dynasty. Through Palah (Panataran), we see the legitimacy of his great-grandsons appropriating the power of the Central Javanese dynasty, perpetuating the throne and cultural hegemony through the story of the man in the tkes hat, Panji.

Ronin is vegetable seller who already did his work for 20 years. every morning he meet the neighborhood and give them live just for talking and gossiping. Ronin is a witness who hear and see the "changes" and "occurances" in small communities in Jakarta. Ronin is someone who always waited by the household mothers and keepers in the neighborhood. Ronin is a place to express their annoyance. Ronin is what left in the presence of malls and supermarkets in Jakarta.

This video is part of Massroom Project (2003) is a documentary video project on Jakarta. The videos consist of nine works that tells nine stories about living experiences in Jakarta. Those experiences pass on various aspects of the city such as: mass transportation, public space, marginalize traditional vendors, voice pollution in the city and survival in Jakarta. These nine works of the Massroom Project has been screened in various film festival and exhibiton in Indonesia and international. Some of the works achieve the nomination for best short filmwork at Oberhausen International Film Festival, Germany. Amongst the important festivals which screened the Massroom Project works is 15th Festival Internacional de Curtas Metragens de Sao Paulo 2004, Brasil; Tales of Two Cities: Jakarta/Canberra 2005, Australia; Seminar and Conference Responsibilities of Criticism 2008, USA.

A reflective biography fragment of three friends reminiscing about their college days through the ten years of the ongoing Reformation era in Indonesia.

This video is part of Massroom Project (2003) is a documentary video project on Jakarta. The videos consist of nine works that tells nine stories about living experiences in Jakarta. Those experiences pass on various aspects of the city such as: mass transportation, public space, marginalize traditional vendors, voice pollution in the city and survival in Jakarta. These nine works of the Massroom Project has been screened in various film festival and exhibiton in Indonesia and international. Some of the works achieve the nomination for best short filmwork at Oberhausen International Film Festival, Germany. Amongst the important festivals which screened the Massroom Project works is Indonesia Under Construction, The Netherlands; Seminar and Conference Responsibilities of Criticism 2008, USA; Insomnia 2005 - Institute of Contemporary Arts, England.

"Life has given me time. However, I've never spent that time to really live." Jen is an ordinary guy with big dreams and hopes. But, time has passed him by. A lot has happened. What has Jen been doing for the past ten years? The political changes have not changed Jen's life that much. What happened then for him was just a vivid dream. That memory has turned into a "film" about an occasion that he had witnessed.

A part of Massroom Project