Baby Boy is a 24-minute documentary short film about Zaki, a 17-year-old ex-gangster. In this intimate portrait of change, Zaki’s passion for boxing and return to education is disrupted by the splintering of his familial unit. His coming of age is distinctly marked by the crucible of impending fatherhood.

The film aims to resonate with at-risk youths like Zaki and both local and international audiences, covering themes such as living in a broken family and dealing with past trauma.

Watch the film trailer below.

The Highlights

Produced a film that deals with important life topics.

The film was created in a bid to encourage other at-risk youths like Zaki that change is possible. Other themes covered in the film include young parenthood and the struggle to change.

Film won awards and is internationally recognised.

The film was also recognised internationally in places such as Indonesia, the United States, Azerbaijan and Scotland. Baby Boy clinched multiple awards both locally and internationally – it was picked as the Official Selection at the DokuBaku Film Festival 2020 and Minikino FW6 Film Festival Bali 2020, nominated for Close:Up Edinburgh Docufest 2020 and won Cinematography Award at A Show For A Change Film Festival 2020 and Special Mention Award at National Youth Film Awards 2020.

Baby Boy was also screened online at NTU Filament 2020 and the National Youth Film Awards 2020. Further screenings are planned for at-risk youths and community partners who serve these youths.

The Memories

Film crew engages their subjects through reminiscing some childhood photo albums.

Zaki demonstrating his boxing routine with his partner as the crew observes on the sidelines.

Zaki retreating to the back alley where he does some skipping exercise in solitude.

The crew facing an empty outing as Zaki was absent on their shoot day.

Taking a leap of faith, the crew approached the house again in hopes to meet up with Zaki for a reconciliation. The crew and Zaki made up, concluding the production.

Reflection #1 – The Challenges

Understanding duty of care to Zaki and his family.

During the production, the crew befriended Zaki and got to know more about his family situation.

Although they were wary of adopting an active social worker role, they found that they were unable to distinguish their position in Zaki’s life and became involved with his emotional turmoil due to his family’s struggles.

They also became increasingly conflicted about how to respond to his situations and each person reacted differently to them.

In addition, they also felt that they were unable to solve the fissures in the family dynamic despite being privy to many aspects of their family life, which derailed their singular focus on filmmaking.

Realising there is more to their subject than what would be shown in the film.

At the tail end of their intended production period, they also realised that Zaki’s indifferent attitude towards being a part of this film was not contingent on his feelings towards the film, but rather his entire situation in life.

They found that he had moved from dreading his commitments to completely avoiding any form of responsibility. The crew then entered into a full production shutdown for more than a month to switch gears. They believed it was crucial to recognise that Zaki’s life continues to be beset with many seemingly insurmountable challenges. 

The crew believes there is more that can and should be done to support Zaki’s family and it is easy to overlook the small successes of the film in light of this need, such as Zaki identifying with his desire to change.

Baby Boy’s production team intends to carry the discourse of the film forward and share it with other in-risk youth and social workers, as well as take these lessons on one’s duty of care to their future filmmaking and volunteering endeavours.

Reflection #2 – The Takeaways

Film has a powerful impact.

When Zaki watched the film, he was moved to tears. Zaki said he felt surreal watching himself. During post-production, when the crew did not see Zaki as much, he fell deeper into his vices and struggled harder to turn his life around. He expressed how seeing the film a few months later felt like “a wake up call”, and saw it as an impactful reminder of why he started to box and seek change in his life.

The crew hopes viewers will feel Zaki’s youthfulness, charisma and warmth as much and that viewers would be able to find the film to be a safe space, with Zaki’s sharing of his life encouraging viewers to contemplate the inextricable connections between family, change, and hope.