KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 8 — Multilingual and multicultural films in Malaysia will have greater commercial worth as they appeal to a larger market, the Centre for a Better Tomorrow (Cenbet) said today amid the controversy surrounding the Malaysia Film Festival’s (FFM) language segregation policy.
The pro-moderation and good governance group also said the segregation of FFM’s film awards to Bahasa Malaysia and non-Bahasa Malaysia categories would only make Malaysia a laughing stock internationally, pointing to the global trend of cross-border and multilingual films.
“Rightfully, artistic productions with multicultural themes should come as a natural choice, given Malaysia’s social structure and demographics.
“In fact, it makes commercial sense to produce films for a larger market than a monolingual one with single-race appeal. But beyond business considerations, movies with multicultural themes allow viewers to understand each other better and this can help rid prejudice that stems from years of ignorance and distrust. Such films help promote moderation and curb the rise of extremism,” said Cenbet in a statement.
Cenbet noted that many box office hits these days have an “international cast in productions that benefit from cross-fertilisation of ideas, languages and cultures”.
The nominations of two critically acclaimed movies — Chiu Keng Guan’s Ola Bola and Shanjhey Kumar Perumal’s Jagat — for Best Picture (non-Bahasa Malaysia) at the 28th FFM this year, instead of the main Best Picture category, had sparked public outrage as well as within the industry.
Award-winning cinematographer Mohd Noor Kassim, who was nominated this year for Bravo 5, has said he would pull out from the 28th FFM, describing the language segregation at the national film awards ceremony as “racist”.
Shanjhey said in a statement yesterday that the Film Development Corporation of Malaysia (Finas) Act 1981 does not state that only the national language should be used for filmmaking and that there is no definition either of a “national film” or a “Malaysian film”.
Cenbet said today that it was “grossly unfair” to restrict the top awards at the FFM to films made exclusively in the Malay language.
“Winners of the FFM awards should be judged solely by its creative, artistic and technical strength,” it said, pointing out that FFM’s name indicates that it is held as a recognition of “Malaysian films, not films of the Malay language”.
“Cenbet understands and respect the need to uphold and promote Malay as the national language. Finas may want to consider holding a Malay language-only awards for this purpose, opened to include foreign participation, but the overall premiere award must be opened to all and be inclusive,” said Cenbet.
Finas director-general Datuk Kamil Othman told Malay Mail Online that the national film agency has made it a policy for locally-made films to emphasise at least “70 per cent” Bahasa Malaysia usage in their scripts.
