Sofia directed by Tawfik Daud is a short film about a young prostitute whose life takes a turn just as she thought things were getting better. The film had recently won the second runner-up spot at the Stomper’s Choice Award as an entry for the mm2 Movie Maker Awards 2016. It is now available on Viddsee.
The film is a taut, effective story that
invites you into Sofia’s tumultuous life. The story is quite straightforward
though borders on cliché as we have seen countless other stories of the
prostitute running away and trying to live a better life only to have her past
catch up. However, we never really get to see much Malay productions centering
on such topics and good representation is a pretty good hook as any.
The actors are mostly serviceable,
particularly Lydia Asyqin, who has always been instantly magnetic with the
camera finding her favourable at all times, although I was not sold on the
romantic chemistry between her and Shahril Wahid. They do not gel and seem at
times to be in different movies. Shahril seems to have wandered in from a
romantic comedy, which falls flat against Lydia’s troubled intensity.
The film works largely due to its good
momentum, progressing from scene to scene as the plot unravels without giving
too much away nor trying our patience. The good use of non-linear storytelling is
essential. It is however a shame that the dramaturgy focuses so much on careful
plotting rather than using the interesting character and capable actors to
drive the film forward.
Even though she is the main character, and
I was hooked on the concept of a film revolving a prostitute, we never feel
enough with Sofia as she is constantly pushed around not only by the characters
but also by the narrative and directorial decisions to portray her character as
someone with very little agency. Whilst this seems somewhat thematically
consistent, it is not emotionally rewarding and makes her extremely one
dimensional aside from a small moment we have with her about her childhood. Because we know so little about her, we feel
very little.
The techniques used also suffers from ill
discipline, particularly its cinematography and blocking which never really
serves the story and becomes a distraction rather than enhancing the effective
plot. In one shot, the emphasis on aesthetics backfires entirely, when the
characters are eating at a crowded hawker centre and we completely lose track
of where they are on screen, in favour of shooting for architectural symmetry
and framing.
Overall, the film is an efficient display
of plot and structure, as the strength of the film comes from its well-crafted
plot and editing, which is able to mask some poor creative choices in the
direction and an overused story. The draw comes largely with Lydia Asyiqin’s
good performance and the cultural values it only briefly touches upon of a
Malay-Muslim prostitute and her world.
Written by Rifyal Giffari
You can watch Sofia here on Viddsee: