Half-Masked

by Alex Hill

A few nights ago, I was skimming through the channels and remembered that the local OMNI 2 plays Asian cinema every weekend. This is a reliable place for movies from the orient that slip through the cracks of western awareness. It is here that I saw “Infernal Affairs”, the crime-drama which served as the basis for the first movie to get Scorcese the Oscar. I’m pretty sure this is where I first encountered “Hero”, one of my favourites. And those are just the more popular examples. I see places, people, stories, behaviours and customs here that you can’t get anywhere else.

More than anything else, you get honesty. Sugar-coating is a rare sight among those films, and when it happens, it feels deserved instead of forced. Not that it’s a contest between countries and cultures, but I find there are many Asian films that do a better job than even the American indie scene at showing us not a -realistic- world, but people in time like ours, who behave in ways we might. The kids act in ways kids probably did, do now and will continue to act until our species has reached its last seconds. It does not gussy them up. It is made very clear just how easy it is to start a child and how back-breaking it is to finish one.

I see this much more often in movies from the East than anywhere else. Even the better western films have that manufactured air about them. I am curious about this. Is it that these filmmakers have a greater need to squeeze themselves out from a cramped society and an often bleak political landscape? Is that what leads to fewer artistic compromises, or that lack of chemical sheen? It must be harder to make a film like this than any other. The temptation to make things prettier or more poetic must be hard to endure, and much of that starts with making child characters into hollow merchandise. You couldn’t sell these kids to Pixar, that’s for sure.

These movies never lose their way, never take shortcuts and don’t short-change their audience. This one refers to happier endings than it allows, in talks and myths and teasing that people use to keep their kids in line and to make life more interesting. Instead, it takes us to the only destination that fate would reasonably allow.

“Orz Boys” is more observed than filmed, and through this it finds a unique and poignant universe within our world. It stars an insufferable little brat referred to only as “No. 2″(Chin-Yu Pang). He is not sweet or witty, nay, he is impossibly unpleasant. He’s a kid a lot of us are ashamed to admit we were, the kind of whining little boy who deserves every ass-kicking he gets from his grandmother, who is charged with the thankless task of raising him when his mother and father prove unwilling. Played by Fang Mei, she is a sympathetic character, brought daily to the end of her ropes trying to keep this flailing hose-beast of a grandson in check.

But he is young, and he lacks companionship in his life. He resents his grandmother, cares little for his infant sister and lacks the love of two parents who can’t bring themselves to put in the effort. “It’s so easy to have kids, but nobody wants to raise them!” the grandmother howls in one of many scenes of her frustration with her family. She has a point. Each day is an incredible toll on them. It must be hard to love someone like No. 2. It’s no picnic for him either. He practically worships a local action figure/comic book character called “Kada King”. At least he doesn’t yell at him.

No. 2 certainly shouts. He is LOUD. He has many emotions, but few of them demand silence. I think he cries out at the rotten family circumstances, but when excited he can’t control himself. His only friend acts as an older sibling, who is referred to as “No. 1″(Kuan-yi Lee). I’m not sure if these are self-assigned nicknames. He is definitely the leader of their two-boy pact. I’ve heard their nicknames are elaborated on as “Liar #1 & 2″. Considering the teasing nature of the school-yard, I wouldn’t be surprised if it came from their own immature boyish gittiness on matters of flatulence…

No. 1 lives with his mentally challenged father on one of the more peculiar homes I’ve seen at the movies. Part dock, part shanty, part… swingset? The father(Chih-Hsiang Ma) has long ragged hair, wears saggy clothing and is mostly catatonic. This home is a sanctuary for the boys, who are often fed up with the gray city and the disappointment that comes from the other adults in their lives. No. 1 remarks that one reason he loves his father is because he isn’t capable of lying in the way parents think is for “their own good”. The mother is in Hawaii, although it seems more like the son has custody of the father. He ain’t all there, but at least he’s there. He has a way of transmuting and releasing their intense anguish. When they scream out to the ocean after No. 2’s father bails on an anticipated family outing, he wails the loudest. After that, they calm down. He shares their adolescent pain and seems a distant, sorrowful man.

But note when he offers No. 2 a long twig, leaves still clinging. He slowly lurches away after it is received, never saying a word. What does this mean? It is not far-fetched to think of it as a gift, but perhaps he is articulating in whatever way he can: “I am grateful for your presence. For giving my son company I cannot. For letting us both be a little younger.” With some characters, it’s the notes they don’t play.

The film is structured in a peculiar way. There are “episodes”, but not in the way traditional Hollywood practices might approach it. It all appears to take place in the same turbulent year, stars the same characters in the same place, going to the same school, collecting cans and always under the goal of getting to “Hyper-Space”. There are no sub-plots, but every episode is marked by a remarkably animated sequence involving monsters, aliens and robots watching the movie on an old black-and-white projection. Occasionally we see the world through the Liar’s imaginations, the interesting lens through which they view the horizon. We see imagery reminiscent of The Yellow Submarine, but in a state of grave disrepair.

Here, it is told, they can find a way to “Hyper Space”. A transcendent gateway from which they need not suffer the homework and authoritative shortcomings that crowd their youth. In the mythology No. 1 makes up for it, a certain ride at a water-park, when ridden 100 times, deposits the rider out into a better place in space-time. They are so unsatisfied with the failure of the real world that they strive to get to this Hyper-Space, which if I am analyzing correctly is a metaphor for puberty, or coming of age, or any rite of passage where the selfishness of youth is to be discarded.

Problems arise when No. 2, being a child, is infatuated with toys and comics. They vow to save up their money. No. 2 can’t resist the temptation. A limited edition toy is raffled, which he seems to place more concern over than his own family. A despicable toy-store owner is reluctant to give away the prize he promised. Bad choices are made, and consequences occur when they try to make things right.

But is it all bad? Throughout the film we are introduced to a ravening child for whom much of the cast are extremely good sports about. But in the end… well, I think he learns something, let’s just leave it at that. But he still holds onto a treasured relic of his youth.

I’ve seen enough to make an opinion, but there is still so much I don’t know about this movie. I have been unable to find much information online. It doesn’t have a wikipedia page, and I am reluctant to type “Orz Boys” into Google. I don’t know where it takes place(anything beyond a guess of “Taiwan” I can’t provide). I didn’t know who directed it until very recently, and I still don’t know the director’s gender. I missed some of the start, and I don’t know how much since the total running time is a mystery to me. I saw it almost a week ago. I don’t think I was the only one. The IMDB says its popularity went up 79% recently. The only comment there is a nicely-written miniature review by another Canadian, from just two days past.

There are many points where director Ya-che Yang could have compromised, or even times where he(or she?) could have ended the movie, and I would have been more than happy with the result. There is quite the elegant scene involving a visit by a schoolgirl whose mother succumbed to cancer. This is a beautifully realized character. They wonder why she is able to smile in spite of her grief, and she gives them a pretty good response. A family emergency occurs later, but also accompanies a final shot that would make a great lead-in to the credits. But both would suspend these kids in limbo. Yang doesn’t rest until No. 2 sees the world in a clearer light.

I hope “Orz Boys”, and other films like it do not vanish into obscurity too quickly. The only other mention of it I could find online was this blog, which contains a sad three(3) entries in total. I wonder if it’s even possible to rent. I wouldn’t put much faith in Blockbuster for this one. If I had seen it last year when it was released, or even just a few months ago, I’d have placed it in my annual “Favourite Things” list. I thought it would be funny if I made it a Top 10 list and if 6 of them were just The Dark Knight. I’d have been willing to shave that down to 5. I hope this review is some small compensation, as it could very well be the best movie of 2008.

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~A.H.