SINGAPORE — The Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF) concluded its 25th comeback edition with a cinematic high, drawing an audience of more than 10,000 during its 11-day run, which ended on Sunday.

The festival closed with In The Absence Of The Sun by Indonesian director Lucky Kuswandi, who was joined by producer Sammaria Simanjuntak, actresses Adinia Wirasti, Ina Panggabean, Dayu Wijanto, Marissa Anita, and Dira Sugandi on the final red carpet event over the weekend.

“It’s a brilliant comeback for the SGIFF and I’m so proud of what the team has achieved,” said Ilo Ilo director Anthony Chen. “It is the best edition of the festival I’ve ever seen and I can’t wait to see it grow in stature in years to come.”

Award-winning Chinese auteur Wang Xiaoshuai agreed: “The films selected for the SGIFF are of a very high standard, and the festival provides a platform for original, creative and independent-spirited young film-makers to take flight.”

With a healthy audience turning up to watch the festival’s line-up of 147 films from 50 countries, SGIFF has kept to their promise to commit to the development of local film culture while also focusing on groundbreaking Asian cinema and discovering new regional talents.

“SGIFF this year brought together some of the most exciting names from a new generation of South-east Asian film-makers (and) new friendships have formed,” said festival executive director Yuni Hadi. “We’ve had such wonderful feedback about the master classes, the South-east Asian Film Lab and the screenings, allowing us to restart the festival on a very positive note. Several young film-makers met their personal film heroes through SGIFF and this is always a wonderful experience. It has also been very encouraging to have the SEA film community embrace SGIFF so warmly. The most meaningful part for me is personally meeting all the directors and producers, and welcoming them to Singapore.”

She added: “We have invested our resources into creating platforms that enable South-east Asian voices to shine and these include the first ever South-east Asian Film Lab, the South-east Asian Short Film competition as well as the Youth Jury Programme, an initiative that culminated with participants giving out the Youth Jury Award for the South-east Asian Short Film competition at the Silver Screen Awards.”

The SGIFF — which opened with two sold-out screenings of Ken Kwek’s Unlucky Plaza, the first Singaporean film to open festival — saw 23 sold-out screenings, including seven local feature films and two local short film programmes. More than 100 directors, producers, actors and actress from the region and beyond were in attendance including cinema heavy-hitters such as director John Woo, actors Tong Dawei and Chen Bolin and actresses Zhang Ziyi, Juliette Binoche, Cheng Pei Pei, and Natassja Kinski.