Singaporean-born filmmaker Sandi Tan’s documentary, ‘Shirkers’ has been acquired by streaming giant Netflix, which will premiere October 26th.

In addition, the filmmaker will be in Singapore next month for her big screen premiere of ‘Shirkers’, in conjunction with Singapore Film Society’s 60th anniversary celebration. 

Earlier this year, Tan’s film won the World Cinema Documentary Directing Award at the Sundance Film Festival, making her the 2nd Singapore-born filmmaker - after Kirsten Tan's Pop Aye - to win an award at the prestigious festival. 



In 1992, teenage VHS-bootlegger Sandi Tan and her fellow film-geek pals Jasmine Ng and Sophie Siddique shot Singapore’s first road movie with their enigmatic American mentor, Georges. The film was called “Shirkers.” Sandi wrote the script and played the lead, S, a 16-year-old assassin collecting and then eliminating her own tribe. After shooting wrapped, Georges absconded with all of the 16mm footage… 

 The 16mm Kodak cans are recovered 20 years later, sending Sandi, now a novelist in Los Angeles, on a personal, singular odyssey across two continents in search of Georges’ vanishing footprints—and her own. 




Singapore Film Society is trying to locate all the “missing” cast and crew of Shirkers, in time for its Singapore premiere. Head over to the website to learn more about their identities and hopefully you’ll be able to help the good folks!


Shirkers premieres on Netflix on 26 October!