Lebjaperal's Corner

What will you do when you learn that all your three sons are gay?

That is the premise of Rice Rhapsody, the new film by Hong Kong director Kenneth Bi. Sylvia Chang plays the role of Jen Fan, owner of a restaurant in Singapore that offers the famous Hainanese chicken rice. She is also the mother of three handsome young men - Daniel (Alvin Chiang), Harry (Craig Toh), and Leo (Tan Lepham). She has already "accepted" ("tolerate" is a better term) that her first two sons are gay, but she will not allow her youngest son to turn out gay as well. She still yearns to have grandchildren to take care of. With the help of her "suitor" and business rival, Tan Kim Chui (Martin Yan), Jen takes in a French foreign exchange student, Sabine (Melanie Laurent). She hopes that Sabine and Leo would fall for each other, and that Leo would stay clear of his best friend, Batman (Andy Mok). Of course, things don't go as well she planned them to be.

While the film is light and entertaining, it suffers from slow pacing and a lack of narrative focus. The characters and the situations they find themselves in are interesting, but the story was weaved too loosely. First of all, it isn't clear whose point of view the story is following. Is it Jen's story, Leo's story or Sabine's story? Second, the story did not plunge into the emotional core of the concept - How does it feel to be a Chinese mother with three gay sons and vice-versa? Instead of showing us the emotional struggles encountered by the mother and her sons, what we get is one comic situation after another. Thus, the ending did not achieve the emotional wallop it desired. Staying clear of the social issues connected with homosexuality, what we see onscreen are stereotypical portrayals of gays. Kenneth Bi could have chosen to say more with his film, but he decided to remain silent.

On the positive side, the film benefits from the excellent performances of Chang, Lepham and Laurent. Chang certainly deserves praise for her restrained yet powerful performance. She easily conveyed the wide range of emotions that her character went through. Lepham proves that he's not just a pretty face. He showed his characters' strength and vulnerability at the same time, and he did it effortlessly. Laurent, for her part, was charming as the quirky yet soulful French-New Age girl.

Rice Rhapsody could have been sumptuous banquet of emotions. Sadly, it turned out to be merely an appetizer.