White Rabbit

Director's Statement

The story of White Rabbit occurs to my head at one night when I was alone in my room, missing my family back home. Suddenly occurred to me the story that I heard a few months ago about my childhood. I was around 7 years old when we went on a vacation. I was out with my sister and cousin playing in the field beside the villa when my aunt asked us to come back in because it was 6 pm. There is a myth in Indonesia that children cannot be out around maghrib time. We went back to the house but I was crying out loud. Everyone asked why I cried but my answer silenced everyone, “I want to play with her” I said while pointing to the big tree in the park. Was that my imaginary friend? Or a ghost? Because of this story that I had in mind, I wrote a script about a young girl who is having a friend but her mother first thinks that it is an imaginary friend however, it turns out that the friend is actually a ghost. I have also heard some stories about young people in Indonesia who grows up and diagnosed with a psychological or emotional problem, mostly Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Social Anxiety Disorder. Ironically, the root of the problems is their parents. Having an imaginary friend is seen as a taboo, unusual, and weird thing. A lot of parents call their young children in an unpleasant way which lead the children to think that they are unwanted. A lot of children grow up as a person who has difficulties in communicating and building social life too. However, an imaginary friend is not a negative thing.