Kelvin Tong Biography
Known for his range and ability to traverse both mainstream movies and art-house cinema, Kelvin Tong embarked on his filmmaking journey in 1995 with Moveable Feast. The quirky short, co-directed with Jasmine Ng and Sandi Tan, about one man’s obsession with the rituals of eating, garnered a Special Mention at the 1996 Clermont-Ferrand Film Festival as well as the Best Short Film Award at the 1995 Singapore International Film Festival Silver Screen Awards.
Moveable Feast was the first piece of Singapore cinema to be showcased at the Museum Of Modern Art in New York. Kelvin Tong made his feature debut alongside co-director Jasmine Ng in 1999 with Eating Air, which represented Singapore extensively in numerous international film festivals. Kelvin Tong’s second feature – The Maid – was an atmospheric horror film based on the rituals and superstitions of the Chinese in Singapore.
It broke box office records in Singapore and won the Asian Award at the 2006 European Fantastic Film Festivals Federation. In 2006, Kelvin Tong received Singapore’s highest national artistic award for youth – the Young Artist Award. Following The Maid, Kelvin Tong’s career took on a regional dimension. His third feature, Love Story (2006) was produced by Hong Kong screen legend Andy Lau.
It took the Best Director Award at the 2006 Singapore International Film Festival and was chosen as the closing film at the 2006 Locarno International Film Festival. Kelvin Tong’s fourth feature – Rule #1 (2007) was a supernatural noir thriller shot in Hongkong. Returning to Singapore, Kelvin Tong made the thriller Kidnapper in 2009 and It’s A Great Great World in 2010.
