No point in being a victim: Annette Lee, 34, on dealing with S'porean cynicism towards local films & influencers

These days, Annette Lee's life has taken an almost dreamlike slant.

Her Instagram feed is a whirlwind of glitzy red carpets and glitzier magazine covers. Even her famous self-starred skits have taken on a more cinematic edge.

Her bio says "actor-filmmaker" and there's really little reason to doubt it. Lee's debut movie, "Dream Stall", was received with an almost startling warmth by an ordinarily frigid Singaporean audience, from media outlets to MPs.

It's possibly the most artistic success a local filmmaker has seen since Anthony Chen's "Ilo Ilo" in 2013.

A few months ago though, she was just another Singaporean influencer being slammed on an Internet forum. Told to stay in her own lane, don't waste money, exactly who does she think she is?

Who she is

The 34-year-old actually does have roots in film.

In university, Lee majored in digital filmmaking. She only switched to acting (and, thereafter, social media) after joining SGAG in 2016.

"Back then, there were no videos [in SGAG], so I started the video team... That's how I ended up on screen," she says.

"I had to be a one-man show. I'd shoot everything, write everything... I'd direct, produce, and edit it.

Then I'd show up on camera also, because no budget for cast."

"Dream Stall" is, in a way, that journey come full circle. Lee conceptualised and directed the film. She wrote the script (although she later brought in a co-writer to split the load).

She stars in it as main character Enya. She even sings on the soundtrack.

Part of it is for budget reasons. "Obviously, I saved a lot of money doing everything myself," she says candidly.

But the biggest difference is that while she's still involved in every part of the product, she's no longer a one-man show.

Against the odds

The idea for "Dream Stall" came a few years ago, when Chen encouraged her to consider making a feature-length film.

"He spoke to me just after I had given birth, so I had a lot of free time during confinement," she quips.

At that point, she'd gone far past the creative limits of an ordinary social media creator. She'd produced her own web series, released songs, even did a live show (Annette Lee: All in One, 2022).

She considered her position. She had a story: a love letter to the Singaporean identity, analogised through a bak kut teh stall. She had the skills, she had a goal.

You know what, she decided. Why not?

When she broke the news to her husband, he was "actually very worried".

"He was like, why do you want to do this? It's such a big risk, a big project. We likely won't make money," she recalls.

"But it was a story that I wanted to tell. I wanted to challenge myself to create something that could last a very long time, because social media is so... like, ephemeral."

Funding a film

And then she had a film to make.

In Singapore, there is a template to success in filmmaking. (Hint, it rhymes with "badvertisements").

But Lee was adamant on not selling to her audiences.

She did take on sponsors, but only those whose presence she felt would be a natural fit in her script.

Like the Singapore Oceanarium, which was the setting for a plot-pivotal date between protagonist Enya and her love interest, Preston.

The rest of the film was funded by a mixture of investors and her own money.

"I just work like dog for the last few years, I tell you," she quips.

"Maybe there are some people who think that I got free money that I just threw in there. But no, I didn't take from my family, I didn't take from anyone."

"I worked for every single cent that I put in. But at the end of the day, it was a passion project — I was like, if I make I make, if I don't I don't.

...This was not a money-making venture. It's just something I felt I had to do."

Dealing with stereotypes

Making a good film was, in a way, just the prologue to the story.

The next chapter was to convince Singaporeans to actually watch it.

The sentiment towards local art, she acknowledges, tends to be "default negative". Coming into the scene as a young, female director, and an influencer no less, meant the barriers were even higher.

On a HardwareZone forum, users criticised her acting, the local film scene, and her social media roots. "Not everyone is Jack Neo," one person commented.

Another said, more succinctly: "Go fly kite lah."

When I ask Lee how she feels about this, she's quick to correct me. "People have been so nice," she insists.

The disillusionment does exist — it's a sentiment that she both empathises with and resents. Some people are just not going to watch her film, some people are not going to take her seriously.

Mindsets don't change overnight. But these are the minority, and she's made her peace with that.

Ultimately, many people have given her, and her art, a chance. For that, she is grateful.

"There could be a bit of misogyny, like [some people who] think I don't know anything, right? But I try not to focus on that.

I think if every day you wake up and you remind yourself that you're a victim, you'll never get anything done."

Work in progress

Lee, somewhat self-deprecatingly, describes herself as a "recovering perfectionist".

She is her own harshest critic, her own creative process. But this means she also knows in her heart that she did her best, without any shortcuts or cheats.

"Boldness thrives in an atmosphere of a clean conscience," she says quite sagely.

Even in the wake of her success, she doesn't have big ambitions of becoming the next Jack Neo, nor of kickstarting a revival in local cinema.

"I'm just a random person," she tells me, at one point in the interview.

It's a statement that comes across as quite astonishing to me: that after subverting every expectation of Singaporean-influencer-turned-filmmaker, she still takes life at her own pace.

Won't be written into a story or a stereotype, even by hopes and adulation.

In the immediate term, Lee plans to take a break from directing, go into acting a little. She has a project or two lined up for now.

But maybe she'll come back to filmmaking, once she has another story to tell.

"I'm not overly trying to plan my course," she explains. "I just wanna see how things go."

It's fully unlike her movie, which ends so neatly with its protagonist's success. This season of Lee's life concludes instead with a pause — on a propitious note, but with a kind of to-be-continued.

As for me, I can't wait to see what comes next.

You can watch Lee's film, "Dream Stall", for free at Nightflix Somerset on Aug. 1. 

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