Just a little over a month ahead of its US and Canada release, Collider can exclusively reveal a new trailer for the Cambodian sci-fi mystery film Karmalink, the feature film debut of writer-director Jake Wachtel.
The trailer opens with the dream of the lead character Leng Heng (Leng Heng Prak), who sees his past lives from across different time periods finding a small, golden Buddhist statue with a voice saying "This is not the first time we have met, and it won't be the last" before his mother wakes him up. The 13-year-old boy and his friends believe that it is his destiny to find this statue, in the hope that it will save their home of Tralop Bek, a tight-knit community threatened with forced eviction so that the rich of the near-future Phnom Penh, the capital city of Cambodia, can use the area for more urban development. The trailer sees Heng enlist the help of Srey Leak (Srey Leak Chhith) street-smart girl in the neighborhood, with the pair using nano-transmitters to help record Heng's dream and track down the statue. As they piece together clues that they discover across town and from the past, they eventually meet with a genius neuroscientist named Dr. Vattanak Sovann (Sahajak Boonthanakit), who was one of the people who appeared in his dream and who is on a quest to create his own digital nirvana. As the official description reads, "As Leng Heng’s dreams converge on the present, his very sense of identity begins to unravel. When it becomes clear that the stakes are higher than they imagined, the two friends must decide how far they are willing to go to find their treasure and the truth."
The trailer is made up of the many rewards and snippets that the film received during its film festival run, which started in September 2021 at that year's Venice's International Film Critic's Week. It was also announced a few days ago that it will be released theatrically in major US cities as well as Video On Demand in both the US and Canada on July 15, 2022. The film is spoken in Khmer with English subtitles and is a total of 102 minutes long. The film was created as a way to "interrogate processes of neo-colonialism, and highlighting the alienating effects of technological progress, Jake Wachtel’s Karmalink is a mind-bending tale of reincarnation, artificial consciousness, and the search for enlightenment."
American-born filmmaker Wachtel began his career making short documentaries for nonprofits and social impact ventures working in the global south before moving to Cambodia in 2015. Here, he teaches a year-long class in filmmaking to children as a part of the Filmmakers Without Borders initiative. His Phnom Penh-set short film The Foreigner Here premiered at the Cambodian International Film Festival in 2015, and he has gone on to collaborate with many of the growing new wave of young Cambodian filmmakers. Karmalink is Cambodia’s first sci-fi movie, with the setting of Phnom Penh playing a big part in the film as it was where he has lived for several years as well as being the community where he taught filmmaking. The film is produced with a majority Cambodian cast and crew, including his former students.
Karmalink will release in theaters in major US cities as well as VOD in both the US and Canada on July 15. You can check out the brand-new trailer as well as read the official description for the upcoming sci-fi film down below:
In near-future Phnom Penh, the rich and privileged are augmented with nanotech, and new skyscrapers crowd the skyline. In Tralop Bek, a tight-knit community threatened with forced eviction, 13-year-old Leng Heng is having vivid dreams of his past lives. He and his friends are convinced they are meant to find a buried Buddhist statue to save their homes, and they seek out help from a street-smart girl in the neighborhood, Srey Leak. Together they follow clues across town and into the past, uncovering a link with a genius neuroscientist on a quest for digital nirvana. As Leng Heng’s dreams converge on the present, his very sense of identity begins to unravel. When it becomes clear that the stakes are higher than they imagined, the two friends must decide how far they are willing to go to find their treasure and the truth.