UNCAGED @ New York Asian Film Festival

by Stevie Wong

We have officially passed the midway mark and our UNCAGED special newsletter for #NYAFF2025 continues with an exclusive introductory chat with the rowdy We Can Save The World!!! crew, plus we talk to award winner Tadanobu Asano and director Mark Gill on their latest film Ravens !

But we wanted to give you an idea of all the wonderful events and awards we passed out over the weekend including the NYAFF 2025 recipient of the Best from the East Award, Vivian Sung, for her role in The Secret House. Director Toshiaki Toyoda is this years Filmmaker in Focus, representing 4 features and 3 of his powerful short films. Plus, our festival president Samuel Jamier was pretty much everywhere all at once!

Let's now go to our UNCAGED chats!

Cheng Chai Hong, Fauzi Azzhar, Xuan Ong - We Can Save The World !!!

Singaporean director Cheng Chai Hong brings his fully indie debut feature We Can Save the World!!! (with THREE exclamation marks!!!) to NYAFF. Not only is it the sole Singaporean film representing his country, but it’s a funny slapstick sci-fi comedy that kicks off with a poop joke and throws in a musical number somewhere in between. Cheng first found internet fame with his web series Average Guys, establishing a knack for silly banter and idiotic leads, all while maintaining its Singapore flair with specific language and random humor. He now transfers that tone to his first feature, bringing along longtime collaborator and comedian Fauzi Azzhar and the film’s only female lead, Xuan Ong. We caught up with the gang just hours before their world premiere.

UNCAGED: We love the fact that this film is the sole movie representing Singapore this year at NYAFF. It's super awesome!

Cheng Chai Hong: It’s a weird flag to fly for Singapore if I'm being honest. (laughs)

UNCAGED: When you found out you were the only Singaporean movie that got through, what was your reaction?

Cheng Chai Hong: It was very surreal because we never thought We Can Save the World would be representative of Singapore. Of course, we wanted it to be representative of our generation, of the kind of people we grew up with. But to imagine that suddenly, now we are the flag bearers of Singapore, this movie… this unhinged movie, is now the flag bearer of Singapore? I can imagine subsets of Singaporeans not being very happy about it.

UNCAGED: Because Singapore has a stronger infrastructure in TV production, what is it like as an indie filmmaker to make movies when opportunities aren’t as plentiful as maybe other countries nearby?

Xuan Ong: In Singapore, if you're involved in films, you kind of have to do everything at once. If not, it’s just difficult to survive, especially if you're involved in the indie scene. Like you said, our neighbors have a lot of opportunities compared to the number of indie films we come up with every year. But actually, it's growing, and I think we’re trying to be encouraged by the new people that are coming in.

We have a substantial number of graduates from film schools in Singapore now. And our art institutions are trying to build talent. I think there are so many talented people in Singapore, but the most difficult thing is money. Like always, right?

And the thing is, the standard of living in Singapore is just so high that it’s so difficult to shoot here. That’s one of the main reasons why we’re kind of different from our neighbors. Even people who want to produce in Singapore outsource it to other countries and pretend it’s Singapore. Location, food, accommodation, it’s so crazy to try to make art here. And artists don’t earn, so where should we get the money from?

Fauzi Azzhar: I have no idea what you’re talking about. I came from a social media background, so I’m like, I’m making money! (laughs) Chai Hong was sharing about the storyline of the movie, where this government agent worker is just living his life, going through paperwork in Singapore. And I came from a government agency, and one of the reasons I stayed is because it’s so stable. In Singapore, if you don’t have that, then you kind of fall through the cracks. But because of that I also realized, “hey, I think this is a story that we need to tell people.” Hm…actually, he’s really a cult leader [points to director Cheng], he asked me to quit my job.

Cheng Chai Hong: Did I really explicitly say “quit your job”? I did not.

Fauzi Azzhar: Yes. Oh, you did. You said, “This requires a huge investment of your time, and if you have any other responsibilities, you might need to reconsider.”

UNCAGED: What is it about director Cheng’s script, or even just him as a person, that you guys literally said, “Yes, I'm gonna quit my life and work for this guy”?

Xuan Ong: [Looks at director Cheng] Did you know that I was a big fan of Chai Hong before I did this movie? I’m a super big fan. The first thing he made that went viral is this web series called Average Guys, and Fauzi is in it. I watched it when I was in drama school and even invited them to my graduation show. That’s how big of a fan I am!

When I auditioned for his film. I fully dressed up as the character because I really was not walking away without the role. That’s how much I love his scripts and his stories. The way he conducts a film set, there’s nobody like Chai Hong in Singapore.

UNCAGED: Do you remember the seed for this film?”

Cheng Chai Hong: I think the decision came first. Like Xuan mentioned, filmmaking is very expensive in Singapore. There are so many hoops you have to jump through to even decide, “Okay, I’m going to make a movie.” There’s a lot of asking for permission, money, scripts, starting anything at all.

That’s the process we’re so used to in Singapore, asking for permission. From elders, from the government, from distributors, from exhibitors. And that’s the “wisdom,” right? Don’t go make a movie unless you have approval. And that makes sense from a capitalistic standpoint, you want a clear path to release, to box office.

But I realized this whole waiting around didn’t make sense to me. It’s part of the reason Singapore’s film scene isn’t flourishing like TV is. TV has structure. Funding. It’s easier to get in.

Moviemaking starts from the ground up, from the creator. But we’re stuck asking for permission. So, I decided, don’t ask for permission. Ask for forgiveness.

UNCAGED: I'm calling this your Singaporean apology tour, because every time you guys do a screening, you start by saying, “Sorry I made this awesomely silly movie!”

Cheng Chai Hong: I’m an idiot. I enjoy seeing people do stupid things. I enjoy doing stupid things to get a reaction. And I think that’s the kind of comedy I gravitate toward, seeing people do stupid things. Because people do stupid things all the time!

In Singapore, we’re so stiff. We don’t give ourselves permission to be stupid. But what if we just allowed ourselves to do stupid things, and apologize later? The world would be messier, more chaotic, but also happier.

UNCAGED: I have to ask, what was it like being on a set where everyone’s kind of the same age, working on this passion project together?

Cheng Chai Hong:
We didn’t have baggage. That’s the bluntest way to put it.

There’s a lot of tradition and “accepted wisdom” passed down in Singapore film circles, about the ways things should be done. When I started We Can Save the World, my producers and I decided we wanted equitability, not just in the end product, but in the process.

We wanted the set to be run a certain way. Yes, we’re making a film. Yes, it’s stressful. But we also didn’t want to be a**holes.

UNCAGED:
So a “no a**holes set.”

Cheng Chai Hong:
Yes! We didn’t want crew who were a**holes. We’re already struggling against so much, why struggle against each other?

UNCAGED: I heard there’s a surprise during the screening?

Cheng Chai Hong:
Logistics permitting. When we made this movie, we didn’t want it to be a one-way street. Filmmakers make something, audience watches, it ends there.

But in today’s world, with social media and prestige TV, we wanted the experience to be interactive, not in a heavy-handed “choose your own adventure” way, but in a way that people react with each other.

During test screenings in Singapore, we tried something interactive during the film and people turned to their friends during a moment and went, “Wait, they’re doing this. Are we actually doing this?” And then they did it. It became something they participated in.

That’s what we wanted, to create something joyful, something shared. Not just laughs, but laughter that builds community.

To read the full interview please go to UNCAGED

Mark Gill & Tadanobu Asano - Ravens

Over the weekend, director Mark Gill and actor Tadanobu Asano brought their film Ravens to NYAFF, introducing audiences to the legendary Japanese photographer Masahisa Fukase. A blend of emotional drama and magical realism, the biopic captures Fukase’s turbulent creative life, anchored by his deep bond with his wife Yoko (Kumi Takiuchi). Fresh off his award-winning run in Shogun, Asano decided to step into the complex character with Gill (England Is Mine) at the helm, portraying a brilliant artist whose work continues to resonate long after his death. UNCAGED got to talk to the two about the challenges making their beautiful film.

UNCAGED: Mark, can you tell me about your first introduction into the world of Japanese photographer Masahisa Fukase?

Mark Gill: It was a newspaper article in The Guardian UK about how Fukase’s photobook is considered one of the best of the last two decades, even though it’s all about Ravens. I just thought it was a fascinating story, and I did some digging and found a Canadian academic who'd written a couple of essays on him and done some interviews, and he sent me those. That’s when I realized the depth of the story, that it was really a love story about his relationship with his ex-wife and muse Yoko (Kumi Takiuchi).

UNCAGED: You were working on your debut film England is Mine at the time, what was it about Fukase’s life that left such an impression that made you think you’ll eventually want to develop it into something bigger, like a film?

Mark Gill: It was when I came to Tokyo in 2019 to promote my first feature. The film had a Japanese release, and the distributor flew me out to promote it. My producer Orian (Williams) connected me with the Japanese producer Megumi (Fukasawa), who listened to my idea about doing a biopic of Fukase.

She was so passionate about my sh*tty two-page pitch deck and basically said, “This is going to be an amazing job!” and I said, “Would it be okay if I come and do this?” She said, “Please come and do this.” That was 2019.

Then I had been talking with the archive for a few years, desperately trying to get the rights to the photos he took of Yoko, because I needed them for the movie. But everything just came together and six months later I was back in Japan to do my first research trip.

UNCAGED: Tadanobu, did you know anything about Fukase before taking on the role?

Tadanobu Asano: No, I didn’t know him at all. It just so happened that an exhibition of his work was showing in Tokyo, and I had already received the script and was interested in the role. I’m typically a type of person that likes to build my character from just the script alone, but I did rely, or was influenced a lot by the images I saw in this exhibition. Particularly the things that I gleaned from the images about his life with Yoko. What I learned from those images made its way back into my understanding of the character.

I’m not a person who makes photographs, but it was as if I was learning for the first time that there are actually people that are gifted at this. I knew of photographers like Araki Nobuyoshi or Daido Moriyama, but then I realized that Fukase is who influenced all of those photographers. So that was a huge discovery for me.

UNCAGED: Fukase was known for capturing the beauty in ugliness, when you discovered that was his vision or ability, how did that affect your performance?

Tadanobu Asano: The way he depicted ugliness and turned that into beauty, I think regardless of what’s in the images, it boils down to there’s truth in them. Fukase was approaching all of these different subject matters as if they were his daily life. He is photographing in a way that’s so natural to him, it’s as if he’s blinking. I don’t know that it was an intentional way of trying to frame something as ugly or beautiful, it’s just how he saw the world. Particularly with images about Yoko or his father, I think he was approaching it like, “Why are my relationships this way?” and just trying to image them as truth. So that may have influenced how I played the role.

UNCAGED: The heart of the film is really his relationship with Yoko. Because the character is so integral to his story, was it hard to find the right actress to play her?  

Mark Gill: I’d met Yoko a number of times and I was worried that I hadn’t seen an actress in Japanese cinema where I thought, "That’s Yoko." I was doing some looking, but there was nobody I was really clicking with. And one day my casting director told me to, “Watch this movie. Just watch this movie. Watch this girl.” And I watched it without subtitles, and what was great about that is it forced me to just watch and ask, do I believe that’s a human being on the screen?

It’s quite a raw performance. Weirdly, she’s dating a photographer in it. The film’s called It Feels So Good. Kumi’s character is getting married and goes back to see her photographer boyfriend and tries to recreate some of their intimate photos as one last fling. It’s an incredibly powerful and brave performance from a young woman. But it was also the range in her performance. It’s all in the eyes.

So, I met her in Tokyo for dinner and asked if she had any questions about the script. When I asked Asano, he said, “No, it’s perfect.” But with Kumi it was a million questions! (laughs)  

UNCAGED: Mark, do you remember when you decided that the Raven was going to play a literal figure in the film?

Mark Gill: I sent Asano draft two of the script and then COVID happened. It was kind of a blessing, really, because I was reading the script, and something was niggling me.

What it was, is that I didn’t really know this guy. I knew who he was, but it felt like it was more Yoko’s story in draft two. That could have been a version of the movie and it was interesting. But I thought, "Hold on, I want to make a film about Fukase."

I’d seen a French film called La Vie Héroïque, which means "heroic life," and they had a character in it, a version of Serge Gainsbourg. I thought, "That’s interesting." But I didn’t want to copy it.

So, I thought, is there something in Japanese culture that would allow me to create a character that could act as this alter ego? I started researching and discovered the Tengu (mythological bird-like creature) called Tsukuyomi, which translates to Raven God of the Moon. I mean, what are the chances?

I wanted Ravens to be something different, and this certainly would give me that. Then it was just about developing that character and checking that, culturally, we were doing the right thing.

UNCAGED: Did that new version of the script open up your understanding of the character even more?

Tadanobu Asano: It changed a lot. I would say the first draft was already very interesting, but there was a lot that I would have had to work on by myself. I think there was a kind of pressure that if I didn’t do the role very well, the film could potentially fall apart.

But then, when Yomi-chan made his entrance in the third draft, it just made so much sense. It allowed my character to have this internal dialogue with someone actually on screen with me. And it also needed to happen in a zone far from reality, in this fantastical space. It made my approach to the character so much freer because I didn’t have to carry the entire weight of supporting the character alone.

UNCAGED: Did you have any contact with the real-life people that Fukase spent time with? And what did they feel about the film?

Mark Gill: The main people who were implicitly involved in helping me build the film were Yoko, who’s alive, and the Fukase family, which is basically his nephew. There are three bars Fukase drank at every night run called Saya, Kodoji, and Bar Nami, all on this little street called Golden Gai. He’d start at Saya and end at Nami.

The three ladies that owned the bar all helped, especially Nami. That’s the place he drank at the most. I got to speak to her after the Tokyo screening, she was so moved and left a message saying, “You brought him alive again.” Sadly, Nami died just last month. She passed in her sleep. They called me from the bar, it was really sweet. Typical Nami, no funeral, just some lilies, cigarettes, and a bottle of Jack Daniels next to a photo.

The biggest one we were waiting on was Yoko. And word came in that she loved it. That was a big relief. Especially for (Asano), right? Every time you’d ask, “Has Yoko seen it yet? What does she say?” And I’d say, “She loves it.” That was huge.

UNCAGED: When you live inside this role, pretending to be this real person, sometimes I believe the spirit lingers. Did Fukase stay with you a bit after?

Tadanobu Asano: Tremendously. I feel his presence. And that’s interesting because I’ve played a lot of real-life people, and typically they leave me once the film ends. But somehow, he really remains.

I work a lot abroad, and I don’t get the urge to go overseas much because of that connection. But I was just sitting around and suddenly had this thought, “Wouldn’t it be nice to visit London or New York?” I go to LA a lot, but then suddenly I got an offer to go to London to watch Wimbledon. Then Mark texts me: “We’ve got a film festival, want to come to New York?” And I’m thinking, “That’s got to be Fukase.” Because how else would these opportunities come into my lap when I wasn’t even looking? (laughs)

So yes, I do feel his presence tremendously.

To read the full interview please go to UNCAGED

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