Anocha Suwichakornpong is a filmmaker and producer. Her work is informed by the socio-political history of Thailand. By the Time It Gets Dark, Anocha’s second feature, centres around a student massacre that took place in 1976 by Thai state forces and far-right paramilitaries at Thammasat University in Bangkok. She graduated from an MFA film program at Columbia University. Her thesis film, Graceland, became the first Thai short film to be officially selected by Cannes Film Festival. Mundane History, her first feature, won numerous awards including the Tiger Award at Rotterdam. By the Time It Gets Dark premiered in Locarno and has screened in festivals such as Toronto, BFI London, Viennale, and Rotterdam. The film won three Thailand National Film Awards including Best Picture and Best Director. By the Time It Gets Dark was chosen as Thailand’s Oscar entry for Best Foreign Language Film.
Anocha founded Electric Eel Films, a production house based in Bangkok. She has produced many short films and features, including Wichanon Somumjarn’s In April the Following Year, There Was a Fire, Lee Chatametikool’s Concrete Clouds, and Josh Kim’s How to Win at Checkers (Every Time). In 2014, she was an artist-in-residence at Centre for Contemporary Art (CCA) in Singapore. In 2016, Anocha served on the Jury for the Tiger Awards at International Film Festival Rotterdam.
In 2017, Anocha, co-founded Purin Pictures, an initiative to support Southeast Asian cinema. In 2019, she was named a Prince Claus Laureate. From 2018-2020, Anocha was a visiting lecturer at the Department of Art, Film, and Visual Studies, Harvard University. In 2020, she received Silpathorn Award from the Ministry of Culture, Thailand. Her latest feature film, Come Here, premiered at Berlinale 2021. Currently, Anocha is a fellow at DAAD artists-in-residence programme in Berlin.
The Asia Pacific Screen Academy expresses its respect for and acknowledgement of the South East Queensland Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. We pay our respects to the Traditional Owners of country, including the custodial communities on whose land works are created and celebrated by the Asia Pacific Screen Awards. We acknowledge the continuing connection to land, waters and communities. We also pay our respects to Elders, past and emerging. We recognise the integral role Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and First Nations peoples continue to play in storytelling and celebration spaces.
