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Review
by Kozo: |
Marketing hype states that Charlene Choi stretches big time for her new drama Sara, and nope, the ad wizards aren’t lying. The taller Twin lowers her bottom line for this Herman Yau-directed affair, engaging in sex scenes and partial nudity as a journalist and sexual abuse victim who comes to terms with her difficult past. Choi convincingly plays the title character Sara (original Chinese name Ho Yuk-Ling) over a 15-year period, and channels complex and sometimes startling emotions with an appreciable abandon. However, the film itself doesn’t measure up to her performance. Sara is a thoughtful and well-meaning project from Herman Yau, producer Chapman To and screenwriter Erica Li that walks a tightrope between compelling social drama and mawkish melodrama, and the moments where it slips greatly break suspension of disbelief. The filmmakers try too hard to make Sara a relevant and important work, and while it’s easy to respect their intentions, the same thought is difficult to apply to the entire film. Partial credit may be the best I can do.
The film opens with the teenage Sara’s harrowing rape at the hands of her stepfather (Tony Ho) before depicting her flight from her family, including her compromised mother (Pauline Suen), and subsequent years as a teen vagrant. It then flashes to the present, with Sara working as an investigative journalist uncovering sexual misdeeds involving political personalities. However, her exposé doesn’t go as intended and the disillusioned Sara splits from her boyfriend and editor Raymond (Ryan Lau), and heads to Thailand to recharge. There, Sara meets young prostitute Dok-My (Sunadcha Tadrabiab), and buys her services for an evening to protect her from douchey westerners. Sara becomes interested in Dok-My’s story, partially as a journalist but also because Dok-My reminds Sara of her own youth. Cue flashback, as the film details Sara’s involvement with Kam Ho-Yin (Simon Yam), an education officer who became Sara’s sugar daddy. While still a teen, Sara offered her body to Kam in exchange for shelter and, more important, entry into a top-flight secondary school where she could hone her writing talent.
For the most part, the film continues with this parallel narrative, contrasting Sara’s current involvement with Dok-My with her experiences as a youth. Both time periods present key moments; in the past it’s Sara’s occasional dust-ups with Kam over their relationship, while in the present it’s her introspection over her past. There’s a lot going on in Sara, with complex emotions and themes of reconciliation and realization flying around like so many bees buzzing in the air. The film takes its time to reveal where Kam is in the present, which accounts for some strong story tension. However, not all the events convince. Erica Li’s script offers plenty of relevant story checkpoints to define Sara’s character, but her growth and evolution aren’t strong enough to make all of the events in her life credible. In particular, Sara makes a serious decision (which happens to be spoiled on some marketing materials) that’s problematic because it doesn’t feel like a choice she would make. Besides lacking a proper buildup, the decision seems antithetical to Sara’s strong character.
The way Charlene Choi plays Sara, her pain and doubt don’t seem to hamper her as much as the script suggests. Choi attacks the role with abandon, and shows a strong and resolute personality, but she oddly doesn’t get across the character’s vulnerabilities. Her weaknesses are mostly scripted, and largely tied to her long-term relationship with Kam, which is basically a TV drama staple given risqué big-screen portrayal. Charlene Choi and Simon Yam do perform the material admirably, with key scenes vividly capturing the tension and inevitable confrontation in their relationship. Their connection finally comes across as poignant, in large part due to Simon Yam’s expert underplaying. Unfortunately, the story doesn’t explore their relationship deeply enough, skipping over years while splitting time with the present storyline, which is dramatically hackneyed and not-at-all helped by the self-aware dialogue. Besides Sara explicitly explaining her own realizations, the film delivers statistics on the Thailand sex trade through long, stilted exposition. While filled with relevant detail, the lectures end up feeling clumsy and didactic.
There’s simply too much going on in Sara, and the filmmakers don’t cover their bases adequately. Besides the issues of abuse, love, identity and prostitution, the film touches on delinquency, dreams, forgiveness, idealism and more. There’s too much to cover in just two hours, especially given Herman Yau’s even-handed direction. Yau has never been a deliberately stylish director; his talent lies largely in his ability to inject humor, humanism or satire into edgy stories and genres. Sara is a straight drama, however, and needs a more facile hand to cover up the plot holes and make the narrative more convincing. References and allusions are clumsy or groan-worthy (e.g., the use of the song “Que Sera Sera” as a play on Sara’s name, or namedropping the novel “Daddy Long Legs” as Sara’s favorite novel). Also, Brother Hung’s score is treacly and on-the-nose. Sara needs to show more and tell less – though that’s a tough task given how overstuffed it is. The film is like the Cliff’s Notes to a four-part book series, rather than the single novel it should be.
Ultimately, Sara works better as a character piece than a social drama, as it only pays superficial attention to its discussion of the Thailand sex trade. It’s a complex issue deserving of greater focus, but the script reduces the topic to a prop for Sara’s personal journey – and this is despite spending plenty of time with Dok-My. It doesn’t help that Sunadcha Tadrabiab is given little to do besides recite expository lines in heavily-accented English. Also, the film raises questions it never answers. There’s a possible connection between Sara’s sexual abuse from her stepfather (who’s never really addressed beyond being seen as despicable), and her use of sex as a tool to entice an older man to provide for her. Yet the film doesn’t look that deeply into her psychology and instead goes on and on about her dreams, emotions and connections to Dok-My – all of which is explicitly explained by Sara herself. In the end, Sara tells us too much and leaves too little to the audience to discover. There’s a better film in Sara that unfortunately wasn’t realized.
(Kozo, 1/2015) |
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