As a piece of film-making in its own right, this a hypnotic and visually captivating production. As far as the content goes, it is just too self-important and pretentious to bear its own weight. The mystery regarding Georges is comfortably the most compelling aspect of the film yet is not explored in anywhere near enough detail. That is the real story here, not the group of amateur film-makers who naively lost their footage and have overblown their memories of it.

I thought the first half of the movie, which is the making of the original Shirkers film in 1992, was a little too slow. But once we get to the thrust of the movie, i.e., what Georges Cardona did to Sandi Tan and her colleagues, it was very, very compelling. Maybe we had to sit through the long set-up so the movie could effectively show how devastating it was to Sandi Tan that Georges Cardona crushed her dream. I thought the insights made by Stephen Tyler (no, not the guy from Aerosmith), who this also happened to gave additional context and corroboration regarding the sick mind of Cardona. Tan and her colleagues all became successful in their lives anyway, but they didn't deserve this happening to them after they put so much work into the original film. So if you haven't watched this yet and want to, my advice is to hang in there and give this documentary a chance.

A director explores the myth of Singapore's independent cinema: Shirkers, a film made by her and her friends, with the help of a mysterious man.

The atmosphere of this documentary is very interesting, mixing drama with the mood of a serial killer tv show.

It's a well-structured portrait of a young woman dreams, the ambition to change the concept of cinema, in a country with strong censorship and restrictions, as was Singapore in the 90s, and how someone with a perverse and vicious mind can ruin a so beloved project, and traumatize everyone involved.

Some critics and general public think it's pretentious, I disagree with that opinion, it's not intended to increase the protagonist/director's (Sandi Tan) ego, but rather to show how a group of creative minds can be manipulated when they are not yet mature enough to realize how real life works.