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BOOK TICKETS HERE: Island An emotionally rewarding and symbolic tale of Bora, a country boy who leaves home to work on a glitzy Phnom Penh housing development, by Davy Chou (Golden Slumbers, SFF 2014). A sprawling mass of neon-lit amusement parks, ritzy nightclubs and fancy apartments for Phnom Penh's rising middle class, Diamond Island is much more than a partially completed mini-city. It's a statement of national ambition and intent. When naïve 18-year-old Bora joins thousands of other workers at Diamond Island his life changes dramatically. He finds new friends and new temptations. His brother Solei reappears five years after he went missing. Solei seems happy and wealthy, but is he hiding something? Then there's Aza, a lovely girl who catches Bora's eye. Beautifully filmed in a city undergoing massive physical and social change, Diamond Island is a graceful but sharply observed coming-of-age tale. Winner, SACD Prize (Best Screenplay), Cannes Critics' Week 2016 Many individual scenes here are striking for the sensitively captured details of human behaviour and landscape. – Kenji Fujishima, Slant Magazine Mr. Chou made a name for himself with his 2011 documentary Golden Slumbers about 1960s Cambodian cinema, an era in which his grandfather Van Chann Pheap Yun was a leading producer. Diamond Island proves Mr. Chou knows how to evoke beauty from fiction, too. – Ben Paviour, The Cambodia Daily Supported By University of New South Wales, Sydney. The 64th Sydney Film Festival – 7-18 June 2017 #sydfilmfest
