Stranger Eyes

Singaporean writer-director Yeo Siew Hua’s missing person thriller STRANGER EYES deftly defies genre conventions, offering a multilayered and troubling reflection on seeing and being seen, image and identity, surveillance and voyeurism. Young couple Junyang and Peiying have lost their baby girl; someone took her while she was playing in a park. Devastated, they look for every possible clue, obsessively watching their own home movies over and over again. An experienced police officer assures them that it is only a matter of time until their daughter is found, as the entire city is monitored by a sophisticated surveillance system. When a DVD with footage of the couple’s daily lives is pushed under their door, the plot takes a completely unexpected turn. Yeo Siew Hua skillfully weaves together an impressively meandering storyline replete with shifting perspectives and viewpoints, not just revealing the hidden faces of the main characters, but also the complexities of human relationships in general. Despite the sweeping sense of paranoia and dread, emotion is also conveyed through the sad gaze of the legendary Lee Kang-sheng, who plays Wu, showing that compassion still exists even in a world of alienation. (Maria Giovanna Vagenas)

In the presence of Yeo Siew Hua.

Yeo Siew Hua: IN THE HOUSE OF STRAW (2009), THE OBS: A SINGAPORE STORY (2014), THE MINOTAUR (2016, K), A LAND IMAGINED (2018)