Green Return (2024)

Writer & Director

A documentary short film on Singapore’s more environmentally-conscious funerary options available after death.

Top Prize winner, Temasek Polytechnic’s 8th annual Sustainability Design Awards.

About the Project

Runtime: 10 minutes | Language: English

Synopsis

Caring for the dead with less damage to the earth.

This film sheds light on unconventional options of paper coffins, biodegradable urns, and the Inland Ash Scattering service that avoids the use of gravestones and reserved space. From less material use to a deeper connection to nature, individuals weigh in on their choices for these sustainable deathcare practices.

Although these practices concern the dark nature of death, the benefits that these green practices bring contribute to the life of the earth, as well as allow psychological relief for families moving on from their loved ones’ passing. This film is essentially about the concepts of life and death in the environment and in people, where death can be celebrated as a return to life in another sense.

Given that the annual number of deaths in Singapore is projected to rise to 40,000 by year 2040, these innovative yet sustainable methods may grow in prominence as the funeral landscape continues to widen.

My role as the writer & director

As the writer-director of Green Return, I originated the concept for this documentary, penned the script outline and supervised the production. It marked my first time as director, overseeing pre-production to post-production over a period of two months.

Initial concept (August 2023)

I originally wrote the concept for this documentary in August 2023, a write-up of about 2800 words where I chose to use green funerals and its concept of life and death to offer human drama and mirror the state of nature. I discovered the topic through my research in trying to find something not explored or heard of before. Yet it was important for me to have a personal angle into the story to avoid the pitfalls of a sustainability documentary being just about sustainability, and this subject involving nature and human drama inherently allowed me that depth.

Pre-production (2nd Jan - 21st Jan, 2024)

My group for this film was formed at the start of 2024, and so pre-production began. For the director’s lookbook, I brought over creative elements I had written about in the concept write-up, for the technical crew in regard to cinematography, soundscape, and editing style, and gave visual and audio references to support my descriptions. For the script, I wrote the actual storyline under the columns for segment number, visual content and audio content.

The challenge of making a documentary on a broad topic rather than a specific case study is that nothing was guaranteed. While depicting an individual’s life story can be subjective and up to the filmmaker’s creative choices, depicting societal themes means a lack of individuals agreeing to be interviewed, and having to be conscious of the portrayal of issues and message.

We managed to contact and confirm our interview subjects only around the third and final week of pre-production. In documentary filmmaking, what you write is never guaranteed. I ended up with nine drafts of the script, each with clear differences, before the final version that's according to the film, and it was a process of learning as much about the local funeral industry as I could, then putting together and rewriting the script per logistical circumstances, while still trying to ensure a cohesive and relevant story flow. Due to our lack of confirmed cases, our proof-of-concept video was entirely conceptual, comprising symbolic visuals and subjective narration, nothing specific about our content.

Green Return

Proof-of-Concept Video

Green Return Pitch Video.mp4

Production (22nd Jan - 31st Jan, 2024)

Each of our interview subjects was filmed on a separate day, with b-roll done either on the same day or on another. I interviewed the subjects with a list of 35 to 50 questions I had prepared, but tried to connect it to their responses as they gave them. Rather than listing question by question, I sought to begin by summarising what they had said in one line, then connected it to either my next question or to a follow-up one. I also had to be conscious of how their responses could be edited into the film, and prompted them to speak in fuller sentences while providing context.

Post-production (1st Feb - 20th Feb, 2024)

In addition to the five days of shoot we had in the production stage, we did two days of pickup shoots in post, due to pushbacks from production and the need for more b-roll as suggested by our lecturers.

In editing, it was about selecting the moments from the interviews, each at 1-2 hours long, to include in the film, and cutting words and lines in between to fit the film within its mandated duration, rather than with a narrative film where all speech would be scripted. I wanted every interview subject to speak objectively about facts/beliefs, as well as share a personal anecdote that could be unexpected or touching.

Achievements

Green Return was a Top Prize winner at Temasek Polytechnic’s 8th annual Sustainability Design Awards, a competition that evaluates projects based on their Sustainability, Narrative & Originality, and Overall Presentation. It was exhibited at Temasek Polytechnic’s 2024 Design Show as part of its Sustainability Showcase, and afterwards in the project gallery in the school’s BeyonDesign Centre.