Malaysian New Wave Pioneer Woo Ming Jin Returns to Busan With Locarno Winner ‘Stone Turtle’

variety.com:

Naman Ramachandran Malaysian filmmaker Woo Ming Jin, whose work has been showcased at the Busan International Film Festival from his first feature “Monday Morning Glory” (2005), is back with his latest feature “Stone Turtle.” The film, which won the FIPRESCI Prize at Locarno earlier this year, follows a woman living in the peninsular Malaysian east coast, who gets entangled with a stranger who claims to be a turtle researcher, in a dangerous dance of duplicity and deception. “Stone Turtle” originated from the time Woo spent at the east coast of Malaysia a few years ago, where he met some turtle egg poachers and villages that subsisted on this trade.

He learned a lot about the region’s history, culture and way of life and this became his impetus for creating the protagonist of the film. “I had always been drawn to the richness of Malaysian folklore and myths and felt they have not been depicted in cinema much.

The original folklore of ‘Stone Turtle’ is a story that mirrors the journey of [the main character], and I tried to use that as a starting point to delve deeper into the character’s quest,” Woo told Variety.

Woo was also inspired by Park Chan-wook’s “Thirst” and Hiroshi Teshigahara’s “Woman in the Dunes,” both of which revolved around two characters. “Just like those films, I’d wanted to make a film centered on two characters in one location, partly for practical reasons – it was the pandemic and we had limitations in terms of crew and what we could do,” says Woo.  “The film is somewhat personal and deals with social themes that are present in many of my films, so in that manner it’s not truly a huge departure.