Historical Inheritance and Film Nasional in Post-Reformasi Indonesian Cinema

When Ekskul (2006, Extracurricular) won best film at the 2006 Indonesian Film Festival (FFI), a large group of young filmmakers protested and many returned their awards from previous years’ festivals. Their protest centered on what they saw as the obvious unprofessionalism of the FFI in awarding best film prize to a film that had plagiarized music from other, notably Hollywood, films. Careful to avoid criticism of the director Nayato Fionuala and producer Shankar RS (Indika), they formed the Masyarakat Film Indonesia (MFI, Indonesian Film Community) to direct their concerns about the film industry. Later in 2008, members launched an unsuccessful case in the constitutional court to challenge the legality of the film censorship board. They clearly felt that many of the old institutions still needed reform.