6 Short Film Projects Selected for the 2026 CCCL Film Grants

July 8, 2026 - Bangkok, Thailand — Changing Climate Changing Lives (CCCL) Film Festival, operating under the umbrella of Tonkla Rak Lok Foundation, announced today 6 short film projects selected for the 2026 CCCL Film Grants Program. The project is supported by Department of Cultural Promotion, Ministry of Culture, Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Southeast Asia and Chris Lowenstein/Living Films

This year, CCCL received 241 project proposals from emerging filmmakers across Southeast Asia. The selected projects comprise of 3 documentaries, 2 fiction films and 1 animated film. Among them, 4 projects are from Thailand, 1 from the Philippines and 1 from Singapore. All projects will be developed and produced in the program until this October.

The selected projects are:

MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE (Singapore)

DIR. Zachary Yap • PROD. Randall Go

A couple decides to have their newlywed photoshoot at Xiao Guilin nature park despite warnings of rising sea levels reclaiming the land. As residents in the area flee, they share stories about how they first met. Their memories of the area start to become increasingly clearer as they say goodbye.

About the director

Zachary Yap is a Singapore-based filmmaker and video artist. He is an alumnus of BiFAN’s NAFF Fantastic Film School, Kyoto Filmmakers Lab, Cinemovement, Perth Festival Lab, and Apichatpong Creators Lab. His films have been selected for screening at international film festivals across Asia and Europe. He received the Best Impact Film Award at the Mental Health Film Festival Singapore and the Grand Prize at the Korea-Singapore 50th Anniversary Short Film Competition. He was also named among the Top 30 of the VOGUE Talent Prize 2025.

WASTE LINE (Philippines)

DIR. Pia Duran

Waste Line is a portrait of a group of women waste workers in Dumaguete, the Philippines, whose lives revolve around collecting garbage and sorting each piece from the daily towering piles. Though often overlooked, their labor quietly sustains the city’s daily life.

About the director

Pia Duran is a filmmaker and artist who uses storytelling as a tool for social change, working across the Asia-Pacific, Africa, and Latin America. Her work focuses on climate justice, Indigenous displacement, gender inequality, and human rights. She is the founder of SineSoledad, a global storytelling hub for impact, and a member of the Global Impact Producers Alliance. She is also a One World Media Fellow for Emerging Storytellers in London. Through ethical storytelling workshops, Pia engages young people in using art and storytelling as tools for meaningful change.

SWEPT AWAY (Thailand)

DIR. Thammanat Khorong • PROD. Tanathorn Tanalekhaphat

As a sudden flooding sweeps through a rural community, a stray mother dog and a middle-aged woman who runs the local grocery store, longtime adversaries, struggle to survive. Amid loss, chaos and inequalities rising to the surface, their world is slowly revealed as the water rises.

About the director

Thammanat Khorong (Namthip) holds a bachelor’s degree in Digital Technology for Design, specializing in Animation Design, from Silpakorn University. Her animated short film Sin(s) was selected for screening at several international film festivals, including Audiovisual Internacional Origen 2023, Canlandıranlar Animation Film Festival 2023, Seoul Indie-AniFest 2023, and Animex Screen 2023. She has experience creating motion graphics for advertising campaigns and producing animated content for TikTok. She currently works as a freelance creative, specializing in motion graphics, animation, and video editing.

A SECOND OF LIGHT (ผีพุ่งไต้) (Thailand)

DIR. Panitarn Boontarig • PROD. Aninart Khanom

On an island, a fisherman-researcher witnesses a creature that “should not exist” in these waters. As the climate changes, it not only drives the creature away and erases all traces of it, but slowly distorts reality itself, turning it into something surreal.

About the director

Panitarn Boontarig was born in 1993 and graduated from the School of Architecture, Art, and Design at King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Ladkrabang. After graduating, he began working in advertising as an independent director and creative director. He continues to make short films, which have been selected for screening at various international film festivals, including the International Thai Film Festival, Indie Shorts Awards, Sweden Film Awards, Venice Shorts Film Awards, Asian Cinematography Awards, CCCL Film Festival, One Earth Awards, and the 60 Second Film Festival.

THE SEED KEEPER (เมล็ดพันธุ์ชีวิต) (Thailand)

DIR. Yada Pongsirirushakun • PROD. Alexander Reynolds-Scheel

A documentary following the life of a woman seed keeper in Mae Tha in a northern province of Thailand, as she works within her community amid a world where food systems are increasingly undermining food security for the locals.

About the director

Yada began her filmmaking journey at the age of 17 while studying at United World Colleges in Maastricht, the Netherlands. Living among people from diverse cultural backgrounds sparked her interest in the power of storytelling to foster understanding and connection between people from different walks of life. She later received a scholarship to study Film at Colorado College in the United States, graduating with honors. After completing her studies, Yada returned to Thailand to pursue a career in filmmaking. Her work focuses on stories of people often overlooked by mainstream media, exploring the relationships between communities, place, and resistance through films rooted in listening, collaboration, and shared experiences.

DAUGHTERS OF THE WILD: OCEAN BOUND (Thailand)

DIR. Wirada Saelim • Community Producer and Advisor: Amporn Praipanasamphan

From the forests on the high mountains in the north to the southern oceans, Daughters of the Wild: Ocean Bound follows a collective of indigenous women on a lifetime journey across Thailand, bridging the gap between land and sea and transforming their local struggles into a beacon of hope for the earth and the survival of future generations.

About the director

Wirada Saelim (World) is a communications and storytelling consultant and an emerging documentary filmmaker with over 10 years of experience in journalism, multimedia production, human rights communications, and participatory media in Thailand and Southeast Asia. She began her career as a multimedia journalist with Thai PBS, Voice Online, and independent media, covering issues including inequality, labor rights, migration, environmental justice, and human rights. She later worked in communications with Fortify Rights and Amnesty International Thailand.

About CCCL Film Grants

CCCL Film Festival offers film production grants to emerging Thai and Southeast Asian filmmakers. Organized under the auspices of Tonkla Rak Lok Foundation,CCCL Film Grants Program aims to support and empower emerging filmmakers and youth across Southeast Asia to produce short films that reflect the impacts of the climate crisis to foster greater understanding, dialogue, and collective action to meet climate challenges. The program is open to applicants of all ages with skills in video or film production.