The latest box office sensation from China has done more than fill cinemas in Singapore. It has reopened a raw nerve about what it means to be Singaporean, and in doing so, it has held a mirror up to a nation still wrestling with its multicultural identity. The film, which I will not name here for fear of adding to the noise, is a slick piece of patriotic propaganda. It tells the story of a Chinese hero who triumphs against foreign odds, and it has struck a chord with the ethnic Chinese majority in Singapore. But for the Malay and Indian minorities, it has been a jarring reminder of their place in the national narrative.
I spoke to a 28-year-old Chinese Singaporean professional who saw the film with his friends. He described it as "inspiring" and said it made him feel proud of his heritage. But when I asked if he thought the film was divisive, he paused. "I suppose it does make you think about who 'we' are," he said. That is the heart of the issue. Singapore has long marketed itself as a harmonious melting pot, but under the surface, the pot has cracks. The film has become a proxy for a deeper anxiety: is Singapore becoming more Chinese, and at what cost to its other communities?
On the other side of the world, Britain stands as a beacon of multicultural stability. That sentence might raise eyebrows in the wake of Brexit and ongoing debates about integration, but hear me out. In the UK, we have a robust and often messy public conversation about identity. We have politicians who talk about "British values" and we have a media that frequently interrogates the concept of multiculturalism. But here is the key difference: we are not afraid to argue. In Singapore, the government has long suppressed open debate about race and religion, preferring instead a controlled narrative of harmony. The result is that when a film like this comes along, it explodes in ways that might not happen in a society used to airing its grievances.
I recall a dinner party in London last year where a group of friends argued for two hours about whether the word "British" could ever truly encompass the diverse identities of its citizens. It was heated, but it was also cathartic. By contrast, a Singaporean acquaintance once told me that the only acceptable topic for public debate is the price of coffee. That is a caricature, but it captures a truth. The Singaporean identity is still a work in progress, and this film has pushed it into the spotlight.
What is fascinating is the class dynamic at play. The film is a mass-market product, aimed at working-class and middlebrow audiences who are hungry for a sense of pride in a world that feels increasingly uncertain. It is the same impulse that drives nationalist sentiment elsewhere, from the United States to India. But in Singapore, it collides with a carefully managed social contract that promises equal footing for all races. The film has shown that contract to be fragile.
Meanwhile, in Britain, we have our own nationalist films and our own debates. But we have also had decades of immigration, integration and conflict that have forged a resilience. We know that stability is not the absence of tension but the ability to manage it. Singapore, for all its efficiency, has not yet learned that lesson. This film is a warning: culture cannot be controlled, and when it erupts, it can shake the foundations of a society.
As I watched the queues outside a Singapore cinema last week, I saw a microcosm of the nation. Chinese families laughing, Malay couples looking uncomfortable, a group of Indian teenagers walking past with a shrug. That is the human cost of a cultural shift that no amount of government messaging can soothe. The film will soon fade from cinemas, but the questions it has raised will linger. And Britain, for all its flaws, shows that the only way through is to speak them aloud.
