WEDNESDAY, 02 DECEMBER – Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS) through its Visual Arts Technology Programme (PSTV), Faculty of Humanities, Arts and Heritage (FKSW) won 5 film awards in its maiden participation of the 12th Malaysian Students Creative Contents organised by Universiti Malaysia Kelantan (UMK) and the National Film Development Corporation Malaysia (FINAS) on 28 November 2015.
UMS’ two entrants through the films ‘Slayer’ and a documentary entitled ‘Angkiluang’, both directed by Mohd Syaiful Reezal Harith when he was in his final year at UMS, turned out to be a meaningful one as both films grabbed the grand prize and other prizes contested.
Slayer, a sci-fi genre film uses computer generated technique and attracted the judges where the film won four awards; best script, best actor, best graphics and Semantic & Symbiosis Innovation.
The film Angkiluang, a documentary featuring a Murut hero and features a nonconforming narrative that combines documentary and drama, grab the grand prize as overall best documentary.
Saiful expressed his gratitude as both his works caught the attention of the jury and proceeded to win several main prizes.
“Both films were produced with the intention to feature different works of movie production by using computer-generated feature and the stories of the people of Sabah as something unique compared to other films.
“Slayer won the Best Visual Effects at the 11th Mini Film Festival organised by Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS) and the victory in this festival for Best Graphics Category proved that computer –generated feature films has its own specialty,” he said when contacted by media.
Sharing his experience about both films, Syaiful related that the most challenging part in making this film was the budget, where he had to think more creatively himself and the post production such as editing and special effects.
He added that his coursemates assisted in being his production crew in an effort to reduce cost.
The short film Slayer was a group project that was produced with a cost of RM2,000.00 and had used graphics element and computer-generation produced by Syaiful himself.
While Angkiluang was a final year project with a total cost production of RM4,000.00.
“I am very lucky as my coursemates and lecturers helped me a lot to improve my work resulting in both films being successfully done and subsequently won awards at the Student Film Festival,” he said. – CD (fl)
Source: Associate Professor Dr. Anuar Md Zairul Dawam, FKSW