About Khairil M. Bahar

Writer, Director, Producer, Editor, Actor, Musician

Born in the Philippines and brought up in England between the ages of 1-6 and 12-21, Khairil has been in love with the movies since he first saw ‘Back to the Future’ and discovered filmmaking during the mid-90’s via Martin Scorcese, John Woo and the numerous indie filmmakers that appeared at the time such as Kevin Smith, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino.

With no film course available in his school, Khairil instead took up drama during his high school years and began handing in screenplays instead of essays in his English Language classes. Later, in university, Khairil joined the CUSU drama society where he wrote two plays. The first was a re-write of Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing” and the second a re-vamp of “Alice In Wonderland”, taking the much loved story and placing it within the setting of a university halls of residence. During this time he also acted whenever he could and even did minor stunt work on a low-budget Xena-style action film (that will, he hopes, will never see the light of day).

‘Ciplak’ was Khairil’s first attempt at a feature length film and was shot on a shoestring budget of only RM10,000 (RM8,500 of which was spent on the camera) during the weekends whilst he was still working in an advertising company as a copywriter. The film was released by Aflam Sdn Bhd and distributed by Golden Screen Cinemas in the GSC International Screens in Kuala Lumpur and Penang. The film was very well received with a majority of positive reviews across the board. ‘Ciplak’ also won the Anugerah Skrin 2006 for ‘Best Alternative Film’.

Prior to ‘Ciplak’, Khairil had written, directed & edited two short films: the first, ‘Nicotine’, was invited to the Singapore International Film Festival in 2005 and centered on the addictive effects of cigarettes (an addiction he is all too aware of); the second, ‘Some Like It White’, was broadcast on the TV show ‘Shortcuts’ on Astro Prima. Both short films premiered at the KSFM shorts. Recently he directed a short film for the Youth ’08 convention starring Douglas Lim and an improvised comedy entitled ‘Breaking Up Is Hard To Do’.

He has also directed and edited music videos for underground bands such as One Buck Short, Liang, Y2k, Dragon Red, Soft Touch and Azizi. His recent acting credits (apart from ‘Ciplak’) include the short film ‘Seeing Things’ and feature film ‘Wrath’, both directed by Tony Pietra as well as roles in Ghost on 8TV, Hartamas on NTV7 and telemovie Puaka Topeng Putih on Astro Ria.

On television, Khairil has directed 4 episodes of the TV series ‘Dark City’, which aired on Astro Ria in 2007. He also wrote 4 episodes (3 of which he directed) as well as acted in a number of them. He also directed the second season of ‘Ampang Medikal’ on NTV7 and wrote seven episodes of season two of ‘Ghost’ on 8TV, of which he directed episode four.

Khairil has his own production company, ‘Checkered Past’, plays in blues/rock n’ roll band ‘Rollin Sixers’ and also writes his own solo music for no particular reason. In earlier 2011 was asked to compose and perform two songs for ‘Life Sdn Bhd 6: Abuse’ and is currently composing two songs for the upcoming musical ‘Malaysian Girls’.

In the past two years he has also tread the boards of The Actors Studio where he was one of the writers and performers of the devised piece ‘Lost and Found’ directed by Gavin Yap and Joe Hasham and directed one of the four plays for EMP’s upcoming production ‘Bars and Bedrooms’. He also wrote two songs for ‘Life Sdn Bhd 6: Abuse’ and ‘Malaysian Girls’.

His latest feature film ‘Relationship Status’ was released on January 5th in selected TGV cinemas starring Gavin Yap, Davina Goh, Susan Lankester, Daphne Iking, Tony Eusoff, Amanda Ang, Adeline Ong, Benji Lim, Alfred Loh, Shuba Jay, Ruzana Ibrahim, Baki Zainal, Will Quah and Pete Teo. The film was very well received with a number of glowing reviews.