Three Documentary Ideas

When I make documentaries, I am inspired by the room at the beginning of every haunted-house movie that the protagonist is told (by a real-estate agent or neighbor or previous occupant) in the first reel NOT to go into. You just know that something important (read: bloody) will happen there by the film’s end. So I am inspired by the events in Malaysian history that we are encouraged not to know about, such as the Communist resistance of the post-war years or the more recent challenges to our traditionally monolithic political establishment. Conceptually, I prefer not to feature newsmakers but rather people who are not normally featured in ostensibly political documentaries. So yes, I am interested in taboos (how boring it would be to live in a country without them!) and counter-hegemonic terrains. Or to keep things simple: that terrible room! I also like jokes. I have not made any documentaries since 2008. But I have been thinking of these three ideas for some time.