MO SHI MO WANG

A special gaze on an ordinary love story - that is director Tan Chui Mui's gaze on the subtle emotions of love. Ah Peng has moved to Kuala Lumpur from Penang and works at her aunt's restaurant. She frequently calls her boyfriend in Penang to overcome her loneliness in the strange city. When she starts dating the persistent John she begins to experience subtle emotional changes. From this moment onwards, director Tan Chui Mui starts analyzing Ah Peng's complicated psyche. Even after Ah Peng falls in love with John, she still calls her boyfriend and tells him - in front of John - that she loves him. Is love merely an expedient means for Ah Peng to overcome her loneliness? To express such subtle and complicated moments, Tan Chui Mui embeds painful depictions of Ah Peng's loneliness throughout the film. Ah Peng's non-expressiveness has an appealing, listless quality that one sometimes senses in a late afternoon. Can Ah Peng overcome all things through love? The film's final twist makes us aware of its paradoxical title. This debut piece by a female director is remarkable in its portrayal of the peculiar flow of hushed emotions. (Kim Ji-Seok)