The Coffee and Toast Chat

Last Thursday, we had a 2-session makeup class of Communication, Media and Propaganda. This subject is lectured by Alex Sihar. We had the makeup class in Binus FX, so we held the class in Ya Kun Kaya Toast instead of studying in the classroom because we were hungry and we wanted a class outside the classroom. Our chitchats were so fun and it made my mind opened to many things. There were me and some of the classmates.

We ordered coffee and toasts. At first, we had a chitchat about Cynthia's project which is the LGBT PSA. About how Cynthia should approach and who is the target market. At first, Cynthia proposed to make the PSA for the LG people. But then, after the discussion, we found out that maybe Cynthia can also approach the parents of the LG people. There was even the random chat of "what if your child is a gay/lesbian". Various answers were thrown from all of us. 

But, from all discussions, one of the most memorable chats that I had is about the restoration of the film Lewat Djam Malam. Alex, as the head of Konfiden, worked hard for 2 years so he could get the funding for his restoration project. He asked funding from the Government of Indonesia and talked with 2 ministers but he did not get any response. The one who finally gave funding is National Museum of Singapore (NMS) and World Film Cinema under Martin Scorsese's supervising. When Alex traveled around to many various international festivals, he got praises because he (as the representation of Konfiden) restored this film. Many people gave thanks because this film is counted as one of the films with the most impact within the Indonesian film history and also the society. At first, with many rejections and his decision to continue, he got the reel of the film and he felt so sad. "It was full of dirt, I was really afraid that this might break," Alex said. But in the end, when it finally succeeded and it was screened around the world (including in the cinemas), he was relieved. "I did not give the original of the copy to be screened. It went directly to the place to keep it. I won't let any operator touch it. I worked that for 2 freaking weeks!" Alex cried.

The discussion of the film restoration opened my mind about how "not deep" the Government thinks about preserving our own history through film. We as the future (and all of the "already becoming filmmakers") filmmakers should understand how important it is to know our history through films. It makes us feel that we have to be responsible to make better films after knowing more references.

It makes me feel that we as Indonesians must care about our own films. If not, who else? You sure you want other foreign people funding your own history's restoration? You sure that you do not want to keep something good so that your next offspring can see it? I do not think so :)