Her name is Rafflesia Pong (Rafflesia=largest flower in the world, which reeks of animal carcass; Pong=stink). She's a bottom-ranking arts show host who's disillusioned with "those over-rated underachievers we call artists." He's Eric Tan (Eric=Eric, Tan=typical Chinese surname), a product designer who's just about to learn that it doesn't pay to be creative. They both work for FONY, a multinational conglomerate whose mission statement, copied from a Taiwanese company, is to be original.
In the face of such pressure, will Eric and Rafflesia retain their artistic integrityor will they finally sell out to fame, fortune or some other nasty thing that also starts with "F"?
Sell Out! world-premiered at the Venice Film Festival in 2008 and won the Young Cinema Award for Altre Visioni. It also won the NETPAC Award at the Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival and has been invited to 13 international film festivals so far. It will finally premiere in its home country of Malaysia on 7 May 2009. Sell Out! stars Jerrica Lai, Peter Davis, Kee Thuan Chye, Lim Teik Leong, Hannah Lo, Lee Szu Hung and Wong Wai Hoong. It is written and directed by Yeo Joon Han.
AWARDS & ACCOLADES (as of 1 Jan 2009)
WINNER
Young Cinema Award for Alternative Vision
Venice Film Festival
WINNER
NETPAC Award
Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival
Best Film of the Venice Critics Week 2008
-Italian Critics Poll, Cineforum
Sell Out! will be in competition in the Singapore International Film Festival. It's a great honour for me as I lived and studied in Singapore during my teenage years. Our screening's at 9.15pm on 21 April 09 at the Singapore National Museum. If you're in Singapore, please come support us! I'll be there. And, hopefully, so will some of our cast and crew members.
I've just heard that Sell Out! will also be in competition in the Buenos Aires International Independent Film Festival (BAFICI). If only I can afford the flight...! The festival's in March.
Finally, the not so great news. Our Malaysian release has been postponed, from March to (probably) May. I've learnt so much about dealing with Malaysian distributors these last weeks. They look down on Malaysian films. They draw conclusions and draw up release plans for our films BEFORE they've even seen the films! One distributor who has been in the industry for close to 30 years even advised me to copy Hollywood movies and not try doing original stuff. I stared at him and realised that I was living a scene from Sell Out! The entire distribution experience so far has been surreal. It's like someone's telling me Sell Out! Part 2 should be all about film distribution in this country.
Fighting against these people is so exhausting. Makes me wonder if I shouldn't write novels instead.
Writer/Director: Joon Han
Director of Photography: Eric Yeong
Sound: Ram @ Sean Chia (Tune Army)
Production Designer: Jimmy Bong
Location Manager: Adam Chong
Hair & Make-up: Monica Lee
Assistant Director: Kareem Koh
Production Manager: Jackie Urban Poh
Script Supervisor: James Wong
Music: Joon Han, Bruno Brugnano, Jamorn Vathakanon
8-in-1 Super Soyamaker Design: Nicholas Lim
Sound Mix: Boom Suvagondha
Film Post-Production: The Post Bangkok
Cast: Jerrica Lai, Peter Davis, Kee Thuan Chye, Lim Teik Leong, Wong Wai Hoong, Lee Szu Hung, Hannah Lo
Sell Out!
(Malaysia)
By DEREK ELLEY
An Astro Shaw presentation of an Amok Films production. (International sales: Amok, Kulala Lumpur.) Produced by Yeo Joon-han. Executive producer, Mohd. Sofiyan Bin Abdul Rahman.
Directed, written by Yeo Joon-han.
With: Jerrica Lai, Peter Davis, Kee Thuan-chye, Lim Teik-long, Lee Szu-hung, Wong Wai-hoong, Hannah Lo.
Billing itself as probably “Malaysia’s first Manglish so-called musical,” multihyphenate Yeo Joon-han’s “Sell Out!” is an overlong attempt at a satire on business and media greed that’s played and helmed with a sophomoric enthusiasm. Sustained largely by a spunky performance from lead actress Jerrica Lai (sole standout in the non-pro cast), plus a couple punchy songs and comic routines, this isn’t going to sell out anywhere soon but is at least a change from the navel-gazing fare that generally reps Malaysia at fests.
Opening sequence, in which TV arts host Rafflesia Pong (Lai) interviews a boring local filmmaker about his prize-winning boring movie, is the funniest thing in the picture. Slim story thereafter centers on Pong’s new reality show, which interviews people on their deathbeds, and the attempt by a nerdy Eurasian, Eric Tan (Peter Davis), to market a Super Soyamaker machine after being fired by his bosses (Kee Thuan-chye, Lim Teik-long) for thinking too originally. Forced humor and general lack of comic timing are exacerbated by Yeo’s shapeless direction. However, cutting by 20 minutes could give pic a second chance.
An upcoming Malaysian filmmaker discusses selling out, Southeast Asia, and the complex identity of cinema south of our border
KONG RITHDEE
Corporate greed meets an ultra-shameless reality show, and Sondheimian musical numbers break out in the midst of English-Cantonese-Bahasa chattering. To call the whole shebang a Faustian tale is an understatement; the feature debut by upcoming Malaysian filmmaker Yeo Joon Han is a spiky satire of the new Malaysia - or to push it a little, of the creative and capitalistic topography of new Southeast Asia in which selling out is increasingly not an exception but a norm.
In Joon Han's bluntly titled Sell Out! (always with the exclamation mark!), exaggerated as well as subtle gags are deployed to mock ignorant journalists, bigheaded artists, fame-drunk TV hosts and rich, philistine company CEOs. In short, it's a story of our time. With clever humour the movie gets away with what could pass as provocative jokes as it teases stingy Chinese, lazy Malays and that special clan who dominate Southeast Asian showbiz: beautiful half-breeds with a posh English accent. Joon Han set out to make a stinging comedy. Yet along the way the Chinese-Malaysian also sketches the racial, economic and linguistic identities of his homeland.
"My film speaks English, Malay and Cantonese, because that's what we do in life, that's what's crazy and fascinating about Malaysia," says Joon Han, a trained lawyer who dumped litigation for copywriting and finally movie-making. "I make a comedy because I live my whole life in humour, I can't separate it from me," he continues. "Even when I think the concern is serious, I end up making jokes along the way. I think, hey, you're not going to be here a long time, so why be so depressed?"
The man felt the aversion about cracking jokes in the KL courtroom, where he believed it's not easy to practice law for either money or justice, so making movies seems more fitting. Spending years raising money, Joon Han made a short film called Adults Only in 2006. It went as far as winning a prize at the coveted Venice Film Festival, the occasion which brought him into contact with a number of excited but ignorant reporters at home ("they wanted to interview me, but never wanted to see my film!") This September the Critics' Week in Venice premiered Sell Out! to a positive reception, and the movie arrived on our shores last week at the World Film Festival of Bangkok, where audiences came out with satisfying titters.
They should. In Sell Out!, a Chinese-Malay host of an art programme, in a bid to outdo her pretty British-Malay rival, comes up with the ultimate reality show: for each episode, she'd interview a dying person on his/her deathbed, adamant to capture the magic moment of death on camera. Plucky and rabid, she doesn't rule out murder if necessary. In the meantime, an idealistic product designer is told by his bosses to build a self-destructive mechanism in his new appliance, so the company can sell more units. When he refuses, the two loony bosses take the man to an exorcist, who promises to drive out the dreamer in him. Amid all of this, the characters have the habit of breaking into songs - with the centrepiece sung by the ensemble of rich and poor Malaysians called Money.
"Many lines in the film came from my old boss," says Joon-han. "Once he barked at me when I was leaving the ad agency, telling me I couldn't quit because 'your parents have no money.' Can you believe that? You don't bring your parents into this, it's so un-Asian! I didn't know we'd gone down to that level!
"In Malaysia, issues like greed and money interest the Chinese more than they do the Malay," he continues. "I find the Malays are not so worried about practical issues as much as the Chinese [because of the government's affirmative action.] So our priorities are different. That's why the Malays are more soulful than the Chinese. They're more artistic, and they can dedicate themselves to painting or art or music. And that's why my movies are very Chinese in a sense."
Malaysia's complex ethnic structure is both a blessing and a burden for the film industry, says Joon Han. To put it bluntly, the country's racial make-up plays a part in the thinking of moviemakers and investors in the way that Thai studios wouldn't understand. Moreover, the burgeoning independent film scene, so championed by European art buffs, has compounded the issue of identity and relevance for young directors at work in the country today.
"In Malaysia, the Malays only watch the mainstream Malay-language films, but the Chinese won't, because the content is very Malay," says Joon Han. "There are no Chinese-language films made by Malaysians - we only watch those imported from Hong Kong. But there's also a Chinese movie company that only makes Malay-language films, because they make huge money from that. And now there's a Malay director who's making a kung fu film in Chinese.
"Thailand has one crucial thing that we don't have: A common language. I speak different languages everyday depending on who I'm talking to. For a director, all of this is weird and exciting at once, since you cannot make one film that everybody will get in all levels. For me, still, I don't think of my audience in terms of race. I think the real barrier is whether we can make good films or not."
It's complicated enough within the domestic map, but now that Malaysian indie movies have travelled to film festivals around the globe, the question of cultural honesty and audience participation become ever more potent. "When my short film won an award in Venice - and it was just a small award! -
reporters came to me and tried to make a hero out of me even though they didn't care to watch my film. Perhaps it's an inferiority complex. We want to feel good, we want to be able to say that Malaysian cinema is rising, though the fact remains that we have only a handful of good directors - and we can't even compete with Thailand!
"I think film festivals are important. They open my eyes and they show that human beings everywhere have something in common that makes them understand movies from different places. But still, what is more important, that my film won an award in Europe, or that 100,000 people in Malaysia, or in Thailand and Singapore - these people closer to my home - liked my films? Sometimes we may try to please film festivals in the West so that we end up making movies that are not true to ourselves. Some of us are scornful of commercial cinema, thinking it's the worst kind, but to make art films with the aim of getting into film festivals is probably just as bad."
In the strange, tastemaking business of the movies, it's unlikely that Sell Out! will secure a regular release in Thai multiplexes. Indeed this is an extension of the same issue about identity: this humorous, wink-filled comedy relies on jokes that most Southeast Asians can relate to (more than we can relate to, say, the Jewish-flavoured jokes in Zohan), but it will go largely unseen in the region it's supposed to belong. Likewise, we in Bangkok hardly see any Singaporean and Indonesian films despite the fact that many of them display significance in terms of social and cultural urgency.
"Sell Out! went to show at a few countries, and people laugh at different jokes at each place," says Joon Han. "At the Venice screening, one guy laughed his head off at this one joke about a half-breed VJ that no one else in the theatre seemed to get, and I knew that he must be from Malaysia or Southeast Asia. I'm glad that in Bangkok, people seemed to get that joke too."
By the way in Malaysia, Thai ghost movies are always big hits among both Malays and Chinese (maybe even with Indians). Not to mention the phenomenon of Ong-bak. In contrast, we don't have the luxury of seeing many Malaysian movies here. "Maybe we have to start making more movies for the region," says Joon Han, laughing. "We always look up to Thailand in terms of cinema. Now we have to start doing something to catch up."
Yeo Joon Han's first short film, "Adults Only," premiered at the Venice Film Festival in 2006, won the Special Mention and went on to screen at over 20 international film festivals, garnering several more awards along the way
This year, He released his first full-length feature film. World-premiering in competition at the Venice Film Festival's Critic's Week, "Sell Out!" brought the house down with laughter and applause at all 3 of its screenings, eventually winning the Young Cinema Award for Alternative Vision and developing a devoted cult following.
My personal measure of an excellent comedy, is whether or not it reduces me to tears that roll uncontrollably coupled with some really deep-felt hearty laughter. While I'd like to pride myself with a good sense of humour, it does take some effort to really elicit that kind of a reaction from me, and Sell Out! does that by the bucketloads, and through a variety of methods ranging from slapstick to the wry, from the staring-in-your-face obvious to the wink-wink-insider-jokes too.
Yeo Joon Han dug deep into his plethora of talent, wearing the hats for producing, writing, editing, directing and, check this out - writing the songs (lyrics and music composition) as well! And the songs are a definite highlight of the film, while not so much a musical per-se, but does have characters breaking into song to move the narrative forward. And in true, witty nature, look out for that moment that calls for YOUR participation! Jack Neo may feel threatened that Joon Han's Money song easily rivals those he oft feature in his Money No Enough series, but my personal fan-favourite amongst the tunes would be "You're Not My Type", with Jerrica Lai and Peter Davis delivering a duet that has to be experienced with proper sound on the big screen for its wonderful accompanying visuals that capture character emotions just perfectly.
From the get go, Joon Han delivers every step of the way, all the way to the final frame, without condescending nor making the audience feel stupid. Rather, he turned the tables on himself first, in self-deprecating fashion to introduce himself as an arty-farty director and pokes fun at question-and-answer, art and commercial films, and you'll even be treated to a screening of his award winning short with some really inane dialogue. From that point on with your attention arrested, Joon Han throws every subject into the narrative almost effortlessly, with themes that are easily identifiable, but always keeping an eye out to ensure that the fun factor in every scene is never lost.
Sell Out! boasts some superb "mo-lei-tau" scenes coming in from the blind side to tickle that funny bone of yours, capturing little things that irritate in life and provide a fun spin to them, from pop culture to SMS reality shows, and who would know that Death could be so funny as well. There's a really brilliant scene in the film alongside a deathbed that encompassed plenty, and makes it all the more worthwhile for repeated viewings just to catch every possible punchline from that scene. Those paying close attention during the film will be richly rewarded with plenty of funny nuances that we would immediately guffaw at, and sly subtitles also have a life of their own, to hilarious effect.
But it's not always all fun and games, and that's why this film is such the gem that it is. There's a clear commentary about doing work with heart, and wanting to be appreciated for a job well done, versus gritting your teeth and doing something that betrays your moral conscience. There's also a sharp underlying critique on modern society in general, and on corporate governance (or the lack thereof!) since what more could you expect from a conglomerate that calls itself FONY and has a one-liner, though succinctly easy to understand mission statement, to "make money", which is after all, the basic reasons for corporations to exist.
The cast too are gutsy enough to trust the debut feature filmmaker, lending their vocals and performing the songs many themselves. I'd like to think that this could have also been a romance, with Eric Tan (Peter Davis) the honest and un-business savvy engineer with his 8-in-1 Super Soya Maker, being infatuated with Rafflesia Pong (Jerrica Lai) the ruthless, uncompromising go-getter who cannot wait to show her rival, the hot pan-Asian Hanna Edwards Leong (Hannah Lo) a thing or two about the ratings game. Then we have the scene stealers with Kee Thuan Chye and Lim Teik Leong as the Smoking and Forgetful CEOs respectfully, encompassing what we dread and probably hate most about corporate bosses who think they can get away with anything in the name of profits. There are some wonderful characterization amongst the leads, with an ensemble supporting cast to add colour, which reminded me of Citizen Dog when the man in the street joins in for a chorus about Money.
Rarely has a film captured so much in under 120 minutes and making sense of it all through well-placed humour. As such, Sell Out! has my firm vote as a personal favourite and the best of the Festival thus far, being the breath of fresh air amongst many stuffy entries that had misplaced artistic merits, alienating themselves from audiences who feel that in depressing times, we can't help but reject yet another self-indulgent movie. Sell OUt! has nothing of that, and has set itself as a contender for my year end roundup of the best offerings in 2009. If it was left up to me, I'd give this film both the Best Film and Best Director prizes at the Silver Screen Awards at the SIFF. The commercial release is due soon on May 7 on both sides of the Causeway, so whatever you do, please make Sell Out! your must watch(! - I must exclaim this) movie this year! Join the Facebook group here! And get the soundtrack from the shops while waiting for it to hit the screens! Support good storytelling, and enjoy a great film!
A corporate satire with music - genius!, 31 December 2008
9/10
Author: Max_cinefilo89 from Italy
As far as brilliant ideas go, Sell Out! deserves a special mention for how it manages to be very funny and very touching at the same time. It denounces the "evils" of capitalism in the most original way - through musical numbers and pitch-black humor - and that's why it's hard, nah, impossible to resist its quirky charm.
The "evils" the film sets out to lampoon are incarnated by a powerful corporation which is responsible, among other things, for entertainment in Malaysia. One of the people working there is a female journalist who interviews weird celebrities, but since her viewing figures are low, the two bosses are thinking about firing her. The solution to her problem is provocative to say the least: she comes up with a new show, a reality program which will capture the last moments of dying people on film. It all gets complicated, however, when an ex-colleague (he got fired for producing a machine that wouldn't have to be replaced immediately, thus reducing the company's profits), who has a crush on her, volunteers to be on the program. The complication derives from the fact that he qualifies as an extreme case of "split personality" (see it to believe it).
Some might feel like dismissing the story as nonsense, but that doesn't really detract from the film's power: after all, how many things make sense when big corporations are involved? Besides, the film is ostensibly a musical, and therefore logic is, by definition, banned as a concept. And it all works for the better: the film's freewheeling madness, expressed via absurd death scenes and outlandish singing and dancing (the "sucking up" routine being the best), perfectly reflects the overall insanity of a postmodern world in which everything is relative, even opinions. Proof of that comes in the hilarious opening scene, where the female lead interviews a filmmaker who says he will never do a musical because he hates the genre. What's so brilliant about that? Well, the director happens to be named after the real writer/director of Sell Out!, so that scene is actually a reversed artistic statement: he says what he's going to do by denying it. That's real creativity.
Post time 17-4-2009 01:42 AM
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