''Canopy'' is a 2013

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Au ...

Singaporean Singaporeans, or the Singaporean people, refers to citizens or people who identify with the sovereign island city-state of Singapore. Singapore is a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-lingual country. Singaporeans of Chinese, Malay, India ...

psychological suspense war film, written and directed by Aaron Wilson and starring

Khan Chittenden Khan Chittenden (born 1983 in New Zealand) is a New Zealand-born Australian actor. Career Chittenden was born in New Zealand and moved at age 11 to Perth, Western Australia. He graduated from WAAPA (Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts) ...

and Mo Tzu-yi. Set against the backdrop of the

Battle of Singapore The Fall of Singapore, also known as the Battle of Singapore,; ta, சிங்கப்பூரின் வீழ்ச்சி; ja, シンガポールの戦い took place in the South–East Asian theatre of the Pacific War. The Empire of ...

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, the film is nearly wordless.

Plot

In 1942, war between the

Allies An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...

and the

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

rages in the

jungles A jungle is land covered with dense forest and tangled vegetation, usually in tropical climates. Application of the term has varied greatly during the past recent century. Etymology The word ''jungle'' originates from the Sanskrit word ''ja� ...

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

. Jim (

), a

Flight Lieutenant Flight lieutenant is a junior commissioned rank in air forces that use the Royal Air Force (RAF) system of ranks, especially in Commonwealth countries. It has a NATO rank code of OF-2. Flight lieutenant is abbreviated as Flt Lt in the India ...

in the

Royal Australian Air Force "Through Adversity to the Stars" , colours = , colours_label = , march = , mascot = , anniversaries = RAAF Anniversary Commemoration ...

, awakens to find himself hanging from a tree by his parachute, shot down in action. Disentangling himself he realises that he has lost his pistol, his only form of defence but manages to salvage his survival gear and sets off into the jungle, narrowly avoiding a Japanese patrol. Making his way through mud, swamp and a field full of Japanese propaganda leaflets, he eventually runs into

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...

guerrilla fighter Seng ( Morning Mo Tzu-Yi) from the

Dalforce Dalforce, or the Singapore Overseas Chinese Anti-Japanese Volunteer Army (星華義勇軍; ''Xinghua Yi Yong Jun'') was an irregular forces/ guerrilla unit within the British Straits Settlements Volunteer Force during World War II. Its members ...

who has also been separated from his unit behind enemy lines. They have another close encounter with a Japanese patrol and elect to set off together to aid each other in reaching friendly territory, despite not being able to speak the other's language. Early on in their travels Seng is aggrieved to find the body of a comrade he was close to. They are briefly separated when Jim is left to contemplate the scene but he is alerted to Seng's location by the sound of gunfire. Jim is forced to rush to Seng's aid as the guerrilla collapses from a gunshot sustained to the abdomen, the Australian being forced to perform emergency surgery to retrieve the bullet with only bare hands and his sparse survival kit while simultaneously having to keep Seng silent to avoid the attention of the Japanese patrol. The following night, flashbacks of his 36 hours in the jungle are interrupted as Seng wakes Jim to alert him to another Japanese patrol walking right by them, before the pair are briefly forced to fight off venomous insects from the tree which they had been sleeping under. As they settle back under the tree for the night, Seng shows Jim a photo of his family, causing Jim to drift into a reverie remembering his own wife back home. Jim awakes from his memories to find it is the next morning. He and Seng share a moment together in which they finally learn each other's names before Japanese soldiers find and separate them. As Seng is killed in cold blood by the patrol's officer, troops drag Jim away to a truck and he is driven off to the Japanese base. He watches helplessly out of the back of the truck, knowing that his bid for freedom has finally failed. A time skip then shows Jim back home in Australia, standing in a field of wheat.

Cast

as Jim * Morning Mo Tzu-Yi as Seng *

Robert Menzies The name Robert is an ancient Germanic given name, from Proto-Germanic "fame" and "bright" (''Hrōþiberhtaz''). Compare Old Dutch ''Robrecht'' and Old High German ''Hrodebert'' (a compound of ''Hrōþ, Hruod'' ( non, Hróðr) "fame, glory ...

* Edwina Wren as Jim's wife

Production

Director Aaron Wilson developed the script while he was undertaking a filmmaker residency program with Objectifs Centre for Filmmaking and Photography in Singapore. Filming took place over a period of two weeks in Singapore, in and around locations where actual fighting took place during the Japanese invasion of February 1942. These areas included Sungei Buloh wetlands, Bukit Brown Chinese Cemetery and

Macritchie Reservoir MacRitchie Reservoir is Singapore's oldest reservoir. The reservoir was completed in 1868 by impounding water from an earth embankment, and was then known as the Impounding Reservoir or Thomson Reservoir. History Before the early 19th centu ...

. Additional filming was carried out in Australia in

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

, close to the township of

Tocumwal Tocumwal ( ) is a town in the southern Riverina region of New South Wales, Australia, in the Berrigan Shire local government area, near the Victorian border. The town is situated on the banks of the Murray River, north of the city of Melbourne. ...

. Post-production of the film was partly financed using

crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and alternative finance. In 2015, over was raised worldwide by crow ...

through

Pozible Pozible is an Australia-based crowdfunding platform and community-building tool for creative projects and ideas. It was developed to help people raise funds. Model Pozible is a crowdfunding platform and creative community. Projects are launc ...

.Peter Galvin, "Aaron Wilson - Canopy", ''SBS Films'' 24 Apr 2014
accessed 5 June 2014

Release

''Canopy'' had its world premiere at the 2013

Toronto International Film Festival The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1976, TIFF has grown to become a permane ...

, and was selected for screening at other major film festivals, including

Busan International Film Festival The Busan International Film Festival (BIFF, previously Pusan International Film Festival, PIFF), held annually in Haeundae-gu, Busan (''also'' Pusan), South Korea, is one of the most significant film festivals in Asia. The first festi ...

Shanghai International Film Festival The Shanghai International Film Festival (, French: ''Festival international du film de Shanghai''), abbreviated SIFF, is one of the largest film festivals in East Asia. "China's biggest film festival" according to the Hollywood Reporter. Nex ...

and

International Film Festival Rotterdam The International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) is an annual film festival held at the end of January in various locations in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Since its foundation in 1972, it has maintained a focus on independent and experimental fi ...

Reception

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, a review aggregator, the film has a score of 74% based on 19 reviews.

Accolades

* Grand Prize - Antipodes Film Festival Saint Tropez 2014 * Best Director - Festival International de Cinéma en Champagne-Ardenne 2014 * Special Jury Mention -

Abu Dhabi Film Festival The Abu Dhabi Film Festival (ADFF; ar, مهرجان أبو ظبي السينمائي), formerly the Middle East International Film Festival, was an international film festival held in the city of Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates from 2007 to 20 ...

2013

References

External links

* {{imdb title, 2232578 2013 films Australian thriller films Australian World War II films Pacific War films Films about shot-down aviators Films set in Singapore Films shot in Singapore Films shot in New South Wales 2013 psychological thriller films 2010s survival films 2010s war films