AFTER bagging one film award after another for his film, Story of Southern Islet, Malaysian director Chong Keat Aun was struck by a piece of devastating news - that his film was being pirated in China, reports China Press.

       "It's a sad day indeed," he said recently after receiving news from friends in China that the international version of his film was made widely available on pirate websites.

       Chong, who hails from Kedah, believed that the bootlegged footage was secretly recorded during the 25th Fantasia International Film Festival in Montreal recently, in which the film had won the AQCC-Camera Lucida Prize.

       The pirated footage appeared on various Chinese websites at 8am on Aug 28, two days after it was shown during the festival.

       The 43-year-old added that the bootlegging of Story of Southern Islet had disrupted the planned China premiere at the Beijing International Film Festival next month, as well as the original plan to release the film via a streaming platform year-end.

       Story of Southern Islet is about a woman’s quest to find a cure for her husband who was thought to have been cursed by black magic and was inspired by Chong's experiences growing up as well as local beliefs.

       The above articles are compiled from the vernacular newspapers (Bahasa Malaysia, Chinese and Tamil dailies). As such, stories are grouped according to the respective language/medium. Where a paragraph begins with a >, it denotes a separate news item.