White Building

Best Actor Award at the Orizzonti Venice Film Festival 2021

Twenty-year-old Samnang and two of his friends live in the White Building, a landmark tenement in Phnom Penh. In this fast-changing city, the three young men practice their dance routine, dreaming of television talent contests, while their parents lead more traditional lifestyles. But the White Building is going to be demolished, and Samnang finds that the stable environment he has always called home is on shaky ground.

White Building is the debut feature film of Cambodian director Kavich Neang and received much attention at major international film festivals. Selected as the Cambodian entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 94th Academy Awards, it also won the Best Actor Award at the Orizzonti Venice Film Festival 2021.

“White Building is a story of Cambodia in transition. The changes are both visible and subtle, in the urban and generational shift, in the neon billboards that illuminate the murky Phnom Penh night, the gangrenous toe of Piseth’s father, and in the young people with their eyes fixed in the future, however uncertain.” Bangkok Post, Oct.2021

ASEM Cultural Festival

This event is funded by the European Union and organised within the framework of the Brussels Opening of the ASEM Cultural Festival

The ASEM Cultural Festival offers a diverse event calendar: performances, exhibitions, and discussions that bring the best of traditional and contemporary art from Asia and Europe. Held alongside the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) and its major conferences, the festival enhances dialogue among ASEM partners by promoting and supporting cultural connectivity between both continents.