Reasserting Regional Identity Through a Southeast Asian Film Festival

Context

A biennial film festival and awards platform dedicated to Southeast Asian cinema was established to celebrate the region’s filmmakers, performers, and storytellers — and to provide a stage for narratives shaped from within Southeast Asia itself.

Hosted by a different city every two years, the festival functioned not only as a cultural gathering, but as a symbolic regional moment — drawing together artists, audiences, and leaders across borders, languages, and histories.

Operating within a global cultural economy dominated by Hollywood — and within an Asian context where Southeast Asia is often marginalized or stereotyped — the festival carried a deeper responsibility:

• to affirm talent, dignity, and creative sovereignty for a region whose stories are too often told about it, rather than by it.

I was engaged at a pre-execution stage to support strategic narrative clarity and experience direction before program design, public expression, and ceremonial elements were finalized.

Phase I — Framing

What decision are we actually making?

While the festival was well established as an event, early conversations revealed a more consequential question beneath the operational planning:

• What identity is this festival asserting on behalf of the region?

• How does it resist reductive or external narratives without becoming oppositional?

• What kind of confidence — cultural, creative, economic — does it seek to cultivate?

This phase reframed the festival from a celebration of film into a public act of regional authorship.

The real decision was not how to showcase talent, but how to cohere a shared sense of value, pride, and possibility across a diverse and historically complex region.

Phase II — Narrative Definition

What story are we committing to?

With the decision clarified, the work moved into defining a strategic narrative capable of holding both diversity and solidarity.

Rather than positioning Southeast Asia as a monolith or as an “emerging” counterpart to more dominant cultural centres, the narrative framework emphasized:

• multiplicity of voices and traditions

• creative confidence rooted in lived experience

• cultural power expressed through self-definition rather than comparison

The festival was framed as a space where films are not merely screened, but asserted — as legitimate, sophisticated, and globally relevant expressions of Southeast Asian life, imagination, and critique.

This narrative also acknowledged the role of culture as an engine of confidence — one that can influence how people see themselves, their labour, and their collective future.

Phase III — Experience Translation

If this is the direction, what does it require?

Narrative intent was translated into experience principles that shaped how the festival would be encountered — both locally and internationally.

This phase addressed:

• how artists and audiences would experience affirmation rather than spectacle

• how ceremony, parade, and awards could express dignity without excess

• how the host city could act as a temporary cultural capital for the region

Key moments — including the opening parade, film premieres, and awards gala — were treated as symbolic rituals, not entertainment alone.

Strategic guardrails ensured that glamour, celebration, and visibility served the deeper narrative of cultural confidence and regional solidarity.

Phase IV — Stewardship (Selective)

When the moment demands continuity of authorship

As the festival’s visibility and influence continue to expand, I remain engaged in a creative leadership and narrative stewardship role to support its evolving direction.

This includes ongoing guidance across:

• curatorial voice and thematic continuity

• awards and gala experience design

• long-term partnerships and intergenerational initiatives

The intention is to ensure the festival’s growing prominence stays anchored in cultural dignity, artistic integrity, and regional meaning.

Extending the Narrative Across Generations

(continuity & capacity-building)

As the festival matures, leaders are recognizing that cultural affirmation alone is not enough.

If the platform is to meaningfully shape the future of Southeast Asian storytelling, it needs to invest not only in moments of visibility, but in people and pathways.

This led to the establishment of a regional scholarship foundation dedicated to supporting the next generation of Southeast Asian filmmakers and storytellers.

The foundation was intentionally designed to:

• distribute opportunity across the region rather than centralizing it

• partner with leading universities in Southeast Asia

• support education, mentorship, and exchange alongside artistic development

Rather than functioning as a standalone initiative, the foundation was positioned as a continuity mechanism — extending the festival’s values into long-term capacity-building, leadership development, and future authorship.

In this context, board, donor, and sponsor engagement was framed not around patronage, but around stewardship of regional voice, dignity, and creative futures.

Outcome

The festival is increasingly recognized as a vital cultural platform shaping Southeast Asian cinematic presence on the world stage.

This trajectory is becoming visible through:

• elevation of Southeast Asian cinema on its own terms

• fostering of solidarity across national and cultural boundaries

• recognition of culture as a contributor to long-term economic and social confidence

• deeper international partnerships and visibility

• strengthened industry participation and audience confidence

• expanded pathways for emerging filmmakers across generations

What is unfolding signals not only institutional growth, but cultural authorship — a region shaping how it is seen, remembered, and carried forward. Film festivals, when approached strategically, can operate as instruments of cultural diplomacy, identity formation, and future-facing imagination.

Marie Fe's Role (Lead)

• Pre-Execution Narrative & Cultural Strategy

• Regional Identity Framing

• Creative Direction & Ceremonial Stewardship (Selective)

• Awards & Gala Experience Design

• Strategic Advisory on Legacy & Capacity-Building Initiatives

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Many of these engagements remain ongoing.
Details are offered with care to preserve institutional confidence and trust.

Much of this advisory work has developed over time alongside my senior creative and institutional roles, often within environments where strategic influence unfolds quietly and requires discretion.

Across my advanced postgraduate studies in international contexts, cross-sector practice, and long-term engagement with leaders navigating complex public initiatives, a consistent focus has emerged: clarifying narrative, direction, and consequence before execution begins. The aim is to design strategic guardrails in narrative & experience architecture, so that the execution phase is worthy of all the investment it will require.

The framework and case studies shared here reflect work that has been tested in practice over many years—now articulated more visibly as an integrated advisory practice.