18 Jun, 2025
Malaysian Filmmaker Adam Zainal Spills The Tea (Gossip, Jury Award)
By Mavis Lee
Spotted on the silver screen, Adam Zainal’s Gossip (Ngompat) cooks up a juicy piece of hot goss that you would want to see.
Following its Jury Award win at the CinemaSHORT 2023 competition, Gossip is now a cherished milestone in Zainal’s career. The short eventually made its way to the big screen, playing for an audience of 120 attendees in Malaysia and now lives on the CinemaSHORT platform along with his other films. I had the privilege of speaking to Zainal to learn about his journey in making this short film and why spaces like CinemaSHORT are important to emerging filmmakers, to which he responds: “With CinemaSHORT, it’s very specific. It’s a platform for films for film enthusiasts, so I think that’s what us filmmakers need: [for] our films to be watched by film enthusiasts. So I think that’s why it’s a very good platform, you know, and a very very good […] way for people to […] watch our work.”
A Mean Girls-Inspired High-School Comedy
Adam Zainal’s Gossip is a witty short film that follows a group of high school seniors determined to teach a junior how to turn her mundane anecdote into an irresistible, tantalising tale. Set against the backdrop of a high school, the film channels the spirit of a 2000s teen drama, allowing its archetypes like the queen bee, her loyal sidekicks and the clueless but innocent outsider are given the centre stage. The film packages itself with the glossy cattiness of films like Mean Girls (2004), and adds a touch of a soap operatic flair. Just like the film’s mantra on a piece of hot gossip, Gossip adds sugar, spice and everything nice within its short 7 minutes.
Zainal's Creative Process: "[It] was an accident."
“The entire project was an accident,” says Zainal, on the sudden inspiration that kicked off the conceptualisation of this film. “I didn’t have a script, all I had was just basically a dialogue on WhatsApp that I [just] sent to my friend who acted in the film. […] So we didn’t have a physical script. All we had was WhatsApp and everyone was just reading the dialogue on WhatsApp and I just envisioned the whole thing right there and then.”
Spontaneity, fun and personal experiences—these elements are the heart of Gossip, giving the short film its sense of authenticity and relatability. From the intentional shaky camera movements, to the melodramatic black and white sequences layered with voice overs, Gossip is fuelled by moments of spontaneous creativity.
Zainal reveals that his creative decisions emerged intuitively and through experimentation: “I wanted [the film] to look raw, I wanted it to look documentary-like, so I [did] not want to have a shot list. I just told my cinematographer to observe how the characters are moving and talking according to the script and the camera moves with them.” In Gossip, Zainal’s creative flair shines through, transforming everyday interactions into sparks of excitement, humour and playful energy.
Even in the dialogue, Zainal’s characters brim with personality. They carry the charm, quirks and boldness of people we encounter everyday—made all the more vivid by the fact that Zainal drew inspiration from his friends and channeled their voices into the script.
“All the cast in the film are all my friends (…) I know their capabilities. I know what they can do and what they can’t do, and they excel at talking really fast. So when they gossip, it’s really fun to hear,” Zainal says. “When I had this situation [idea] in mind, automatically I wanted to cast them already because I didn’t have to do much. I just had to put them there, record [with] the camera, now go.” He laughs, reminiscing on how his collaboration with his friends allowed him to shape these characters’ mannerisms from the ground up.
“We were on a group call and they were, like, reading it, and they were laughing, we were laughing and they were like “when can we shoot this? Can we shoot this soon?” And I’m like “Yeah, are you guys free tomorrow? ” Zainal’s free-flowing creative process and his understanding of his performers is what creates the vivid lived-in world of Gossip. His ability to turn friendship and chaos into cinematic charm work in synergy, making his short film so engaging.
A Twist on Fake News & Toxic Sensationalism
While leaning heavily into the nostalgia of school life, it also cleverly satirises our enduring obsession with rumours, speculation and sensationalism.
“I wanted to tell a story about how misinformation can start spreading without having any morals about it, because the POV of the story was from the antagonist.”
Keeping the film’s lighthearted tone, Zainal reminds us “I just hope people won’t take it too seriously and start spreading misinformation because the film is for the fun of it.”
"Don’t force interesting-ness, be interesting.”
Throughout the interview, I could not help but admire Zainal’s openness to the unexpected: his ability to make things up on the fly, riffing off suggestions from his actors and going with the flow. Zainal reminds filmmakers “Don’t be too serious when creating it, have fun while making [films]. When making personal stories, all you have to do is observe. If it feels right to tell a story that happened to you because of what you observe, go for it! Even though it’s, like, short, even though it’s simple, […] it’s how you make it that would be interesting. Don’t force interesting-ness, be interesting.”
His personal ethos for authenticity?
“Don’t be anyone else, be you!” While the advice seems familiar, Zainal embraces the sentiment, reminding filmmakers that originality can be crafted through practice and discovering one’s personal style.
“With practice you can discover what you really like and who you really are.” He adds that creating “interesting” narratives can both come from looking outward and further introspection and reflection. “Seeing other perspectives would somewhat generate more ideas and maybe you might find something personally interesting for you to try and attempt […]. What I did with Gossip was that I self-experimented with editing. I didn’t think of the word interesting, I thought about what made it funny!”
Zainal’s mindset which shaped Gossip is therefore a reminder that creativity does not always have to be rigid or polished or novel for its own sake. Sometimes all it takes is finding what resonates and then having the courage to trust your own instincts.
Watch the trailer of Gossip here. If you’d like to enjoy our wide range of Asian short films for free, check out
CinemaWorld on mewatch (available in Singapore).
The CinemaSHORT Competition 2025 is currently open for submissions till 31st July 2025.
