In parts of Asia each year, during the seventh lunar month, it is believed that the gates of Hell are opened and all the souls are set free to wander the Earth.
Numerous religious rituals and folk performances, like street operas, take place during the seventh lunar month to try to appease the spirits.
This film captures the seventh-lunar-month rituals in Singapore, a world-class centre of business and culture inhabited by many different immigrants from other Asian countries.
While the hungry-ghost rituals originated in China and are still practised throughout South-east Asia in various forms, they are slowly dying out in many countries or may only be performed for several days of the month.
On 1 August 2008, the first day of the Hungry Ghost Festival, director Tony Kern and producer Genevieve Woo held a 15-minute interactive session on the film at Cinema Europa, Golden Village VivoCity, right after the screening.