'Pantang': A superstitious short film produced by Taylorians

By: Merissa Alyea Binti Omar Ariff

Pantang is an upcoming horror short film that is being produced by final year broadcasting students from Taylor’s University as part of their Digital Storytelling And Production module

The five minute long short film written by Jolene Tan and directed by Shaun Yoong is set to debut in July this year. The producers of Pantang have been working their fingers to the bone since the end of April to get the production in works by organising crowdfundings to raise money for this production.

The team did so by firstly introducing an eye-catching digital poster on their Instagram page to create awareness for their planned crowdfunding.

The initial amount targeted by the team was RM 3500, but after the digital poster from their Instagram spread across social media, the team was able to raise RM 3960 to get their production in the works just 72 hours after the release of their digital poster.

Additionally, the team behind Pantang received shooting equipment and prop donations from generous companies based in Kuala Lumpur who had strong faith in the upcoming production. However, in light of the recent movement control order being implemented by the Malaysian government, the production of Pantang has been forced to be put on hold until the number of COVID-19 cases in Malaysia drops.

Due to being unable to physically carry out the production of the short film, the lecturer in charge of this module, Sanjit Singh Randhawa, has been forced to change the outline of the module by asking his students to produce stillomatics of their intended short films instead.

“Being stuck at home while having to produce any form of creative content should not be looked upon as an unfortunate situation. “This may be the future of the digital content creation industry. Students should look upon this situation as getting a head-start in their future careers.”,” said Sanjit Singh Randhawa, lecturer at Taylor’s University.

The producers of Pantang found the situation to be very disappointing, as they were more than prepared to get production in the works after their successful crowdfunding.

The team had even managed to cast the actors for the short film.

However, the team behind Pantang made a decision to carry forth the production of their short film as an independent project once the ongoing movement control order is lifted.

The team is very confident that their upcoming short film is going to be a big hit, and do not want their collaborative efforts planning for the short film to go to waste.

The masterminds behind the production of this short film also intend to submit this short film to international film festivals such as the Singapore International Film Festival, The Good, The Bad and the Low Budget, Japan Low-Budget International Film Festival.

“I have great confidence that our short film is going to be successful. I am working with a very dedicated, productive and creative team who has a very strong mission and vision to bring this film to life,” said 22-year-old producer Kris Aiman.

We do not want this movement control order to limit the potential of our ideas, we just have to be patient and wait for the right time.”

It is uncertain when Pantang will actually start production, but it is definitely a short film that Taylorians should be excited for, especially those of us who are horror film enthusiasts and like the idea of a story revolving around Malaysian superstition.

Image 1: Pantang crowdfunding poster. Source