This film tells the story of Arief and Edi, two videographers who exchange memories and imaginations about Papua based on the footage they captured during their time in the land of Papua. They reflect upon their contrasting backgrounds, Arief is a young man from Java, while Edi was born and raised in Papua. By contemplating on their journeys and experiences, they agree to create a short film using the archives they had before Edi returned to Papua. The archives serve as an image of a utopian imagination of Papua’s beautiful landscapes while highlighting the ironic reality of the existing conditions under Javanese people and military subjection.
Golden Island (Kota Emas)
Hybrid / 22 min / 2026 / Indonesia, Singapore
International Film Festival Rotterdam | Rotterdam | 2026 | Tiger Short Competition
Glasgow Short Film Festival | Glasgow | 2026 | International Competition
European Media Art Festival | Osnabrück | 2026 | International Selection
VIENNA SHORTS | Vienna | 2026 | Best Film – International Competition Fiction & Documentary
Psarokokalo International Short Film Festival | Greece | 2026 | International Competition
Moscow International Documentary Film Festival Doker | Moscow | 2026 | Short Competition
Singapore International Film Festival | Singapore | 2026 | Southeast Asian Short Film Competition
This story is inspired by a collection of short stories that tells the journey of two friends named Tom and Regi. Tom is a native Papuan, while Regi is the child of settlers who live in Papua. The two are close friends, and they explore the forests and rivers of Papua to reach a golden city beyond the mountains. The book was written by a missionary named Izaak Samuel Kijne and titled Kota Emas. I first discovered this book when I visited Papua and shared stories with my friends there. Meeting them was a delightful experience, and it always provided new knowledge about living as a Papuan in harmony with nature. Mountains and rivers are like siblings to them, while the forest is the mother of the Papuan people. Interestingly, Kijne’s Kota Emas depicts how the people of Papua can live in harmony with each other and with nature without causing harm to it, a scene that I often imagine when observing the landscapes of life in Papua. Unfortunately, what is happening today in Papua is increasingly distant from what Kijne described. The Papuan people are now wrapped in sorrow. I continue to hear heartbreaking stories, particularly about the indigenous communities who protect their forests and nature.
This sense of unease became the reason why it became so crucial for me to make this film, Golden Island. Together with my friend Edi, who is of Asmat descent and comes from Merauke, a large city in southern Papua, we embarked on this journey. Through our shared interest in cinema and my long-standing friendship with Edi, I tried to bring to life the characters of Tom and Regi, created by Kijne, within the context of Papua’s today. However, rather than being trapped in Kijne’s imagination, I sought to tell the story of Papua today through our personal experiences. Wrapped in our personal stories, shared in a dark-comedy style, we not only tell what Papua is but also attempt to imagine the future of Papua. The border between fiction and documentary will be blurred as I present natural scenes, our archival footage, and the filmmaking process embedded within the story. In this way, the audience will find themselves in an in-between space, allowing them to understand the context and the stories of Papua more openly.
We are excited to award a film that reflects the best of the spirit of the competition as a whole in its personal search of how memories and historical conditions forge the complexities of our contemporary realities, and how we make sense of them. Genuine in its playfulness and truly independent in spirit, the film highlights the importance of art in a world that’s more and more painted in black and white, avoiding simplification when introducing us to a place, conflict and historical context. Two friends invite us on their filmmaking journey, sharing their process very openly and with a lot of humor. Following them into the jungle and on their desktop explorations, we learn a lot about Papua, a land between golden mountains and instant noodles. Hinting at the complexities of the postcolonial heritage through concrete images of the politics of exploitation reflected in nature, alongside the historic legacy of archival images connecting personal memories and political utopia, while also questioning the process of filmmaking itself, the film struck us as a very generous work. It offers a tender and pacifist approach to post colonialism, military conflict and exploitation, told from the very honest and charming point of view of a friendship. -VIENNA SHORTS 2026 Jury Statement
Arief Budiman 