SEA CHAT #37: If I was the Director: Breaking the Eurocentric in Postcolonialism and Transnational of Film De Oost (The East) by Syfa Amelia

On January, 24th 2023 (GMT +7) Center of Southeast Asian Social Studies (CESASS) Universitas Gadjah Mada held the agenda called SEA CHAT. The #SEACHAT37 entitled ‘If I Was the Director: Breaking the Eurocentric in Postcolonialism and Transnational of Film De Oost’ was presenting by Syfa Amelia as internship student at CESASS from Master Program in Communication Science, Universitas Gadjah Mada.

The discussion was started from Syfa that explained the synopsis of the movie De Oost (The East). This movie was directed by Jim Taihuttu and released in 2020 but it’s still interesting to be discussed until today. Syfa explained the critics from her perspective as a part of post-colony country. Those, from her analysis the movie De Oost (The East) was glorifying the white perspective which made the movie looks un-relevant to the history. Further, cited from Syfa’s explanation she found that there were some scenes that stereotyping Indonesia. Other than that, Syfa choose the movie De Oost (The East) because it is still has its correlation to the Southeast Asian country, especially Indonesia. read more