VIFF 2005 Reviews

So Much Rice, and So Much Silence.

I haven’t been to many films where I can continuously hear the gum-chewing of the person three rows behind me and seat-shifting from the front of the theatre. Li Hongqi’s So Much Rice is one such film. But it isn’t all bad. Set in somewhat modern day China, So Much Rice takes us through the journey of Mr. Mao, who leaves his girlfriend during a game of hide-and-seek and finds refuge in an old friend’s home. With limited background music and sparse dialogue, the sound of flipping through the newspaper never sounds crisper. Sometimes, I think I can even hear the characters breathe. But still, I believe it isn’t all bad – there’s nothing that bonds the audience with the characters like awkward silence. Silent scenes of characters looking blankly at the TV starts to make the audience uncomfortable with them. It is as if I am placed right into the movie; as if the tension between the characters is not only portrayed in the movie screen, but felt in the room. This is a story of soul-searching, reaching out, learning lessons, and characters tangled in a web welcoming you into their tension.