Heading upriver in Sarawak to shoot in tribal longhouses was always part of film director L. Krishnan's plans. But what he did not expect was for his boat to capsize, in an action scene that could have come out of one of his own screenplays.
Back in the 1950s, he says, you had to use boats to get anywhere in Borneo. He was not so much worried for himself as for his recordings, which, to his horror, disappeared into the murk. Luckily, he had split the cargo into two boats.
Speaking to LifeStyle on the telephone from Kuala Lumpur, he says: 'I sent the cameraman and the film ahead in one boat. My boat, which sank, had the soundtrack.'
He would later overdub new dialogue and music back in Singapore and release it as Cinta Gadis Rimba, saucily titled The Virgin Of Borneo, in 1958.
The love story between a Malay man and a Dayak woman, which has since sunk into obscurity, is one of the many examples of Malayan cinema made by Cathay- Keris Studio in the 1950s and 1960s, a period now known as a golden age of local film. The studio, together with its rival, Shaw, made hundreds of Chinese and Malay movies during that time.
L. Krishnan today has deep affection for his Borneo feature because it was the first he had done on location, rather than in Cathay-Keris' soundstage in East Coast Road.
Cathay-Keris Studio made its last feature in 1973, the victim of changing tastes and competition from Hollywood.
But its parent, Cathay Organisation, is in good health and is celebrating its 75th anniversary this year. The close-knit, family-run firm has a history closely tied to the ups and downs of the entertainment industry in the region. In its time, it has created stars and classic movies and will be remembered for influencing the tastes of generations in Singapore and Malaysia.
Now 88 and a Datuk, the former film director L. Krishnan is today an elder statesman of the Malaysian business community. He has kept links to film-making. His Kuala Lumpur-based Gaya Color Laboratory made the cinema prints for the Singapore comedy Phua Chua Kang The Movie, to be screened here this month, he says.
Another historical footnote about The Virgin Of Borneo is that it is among films of the period to offer the exotically ethnic sights and sounds of Sarawak as entertainment.
Another of Cathay-Keris' most valued assets was comedian Abdul Wahid Ahmad, better known by his stage name Wahid Satay. He starred in films such as Chelorong Chelorong (1962), Bawang Putih Bawang Merah (1959) and Satay (1958).
He is still popular today and performs on television and live shows in Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore.
'I'm old but still capable,' jokes the 79-year-old in Malay.
He told LifeStyle that Mr Loke Wan Tho, son of tycoon Loke Yew and co-founder of Cathay, was a key driving force of the Cathay-Keris Studio.
After Mr Loke's death in a plane crash in Taiwan in 1964, 'the movie-making scene died along with him'.
A little-known fact of the golden age of Malay film-making is that it was never especially lucrative.
The small market in Malaya and competition from Indian, Indonesian and Hollywood films made the going tough and Cathay-Keris reported a loss of $1.5 million in its first eight years of operation. Big-budget prestige collaborations and international co-productions in the early 1960s also failed to light up the box office.
Mr Loke's legacy lives on today in the movie distribution, exhibition and other businesses. That side of the organisation has its own stars in its long-serving staff, such as Mr Teo Chai Koon, 67.
He joined the accounts department of Cathay Film Distributor in 1962. His first workplace was not at the more well-known Cathay Building in Handy Road but another bungalow-like building nearby, close to the historic MacDonald House in Orchard Road. �
In his time at Cathay, he has seen the industry change from grand single-screen cinemas to multiplexes and from a one-size-fits-all censorship to today's tiered classification system.
By 1980, he had become assistant manager of programming. One of his tasks was to decide when to start and end a film's run in the cinemas and how many screens it should be given. Hong Kong movies were all the rage when he took on the role, but by the time he retired last year, they, too, had had their time in the sun and are now a shadow of what they used to be.
'They were making too many of them, and they had no variety,' Mr Teo says, referring to how the film-makers would milk previously successful formulas to death.
Cathay is one of the few organisations in Singapore to both date back to pre-war times and to occupy the site on which it was founded.
Urban myths cling to it as a result. During the occupation, the building was taken over by the Japanese propaganda branch and the impaled heads of those who fell afoul of the occupiers were exhibited outside. There is gossip about restless spirits in the area but long-time employee Mr Teo dismisses such talk as nonsense.
'I never saw anything,' he says.
Mr Bilal Sapuan, 53, is a senior operations executive who has worked at the company for 22 years. He supervises projectionists, the crew who handle the display of images in Cathay cinemas.
He has a unique view of how technology has changed. In the past, film reels would be despatched by motorcycle from one cinema to another elsewhere in Singapore with minutes to spare. Today, when one reel can be looped to serve up to eight multiplex screens at the same time, despatching is no longer necessary, a fact which pleases Mr Bilal.
He shudders when he remembers how traffic mishaps would delay reel delivery. Screens would go blank for up to 30 minutes. But back then, audiences seemed to be more tolerant of mistakes, unlike today, he says.
'Now, patrons will complain if there is a slight delay,' he says.
Another veteran who has seen changes sweep through the business is Mr Chia Lye Huat, 64. The logistics executive has been with the firm for 45 years, having started as an usher and a 'poster boy', the person whose job it was to refresh movie posters in lobbies and hallways, then an essential advertising tool.
Now, he administers the delivery of Cathay-distributed films to the Board Of Film Censors. The current classification system is more complicated than before, but he thinks it makes for a much better viewing experience, compared to the time when all films were edited to fit all ages.
'It was just cut, cut, cut, a lot of movies lost their meaning,' he says.
The head of the company since 1984 is executive director Choo Meileen, niece of co-founder Loke Wan Tho.
In an e-mail interview, the media-shy 50-something boss of Cathay Organisation says that what stands out for her during the 75 years is 'how well Cathay has weathered crises that would have knocked any company out'.
'There are many valuable lessons that I have learnt from them. No Harvard Business School could have taught that,' she says.
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