Recently there was an article in The Star discussing the local Chinese comedy which is dominated by the Singaporean. To ensure that the movies will make profit here as well, most of the background of the movie is rather neutral, neither Malaysian nor Singaporean, which would benefit as well for the viewers from the 2 countries. Namewee's maiden movie effort, on the other hand, is purely a Malaysian Chinese comedy, there is so much reference to the local senarios that sometimes even a Singaporean may not get the joke.
Nasi Lemak 2.0 is a cheap movie, that is with limited budget. And it shows. However, there are so many cameo appearance that probably they did it for the price of friendship. It is still a Malaysian chinese movies, as it is made more for the chinese audience. Therefore it is not exactly an 1Malaysian movie per se. (anyway, I totally agree with The Star review, why cant people just refer it as a MALAYSIAN movie, why everytime must be 1Malaysia this, 1Malaysia that...)
The story is rather simple, and so many similarities with Stephen Chow's God of Cookery. Namewee is a graduate from China Institute of Culinary, open his own chinese restaurant but due to his refusal to blend in with the local cuisine, his restaurant is basically empty. In the process of helping Karen Kong, he was involved in a cooking competition. Karen's father is involved in a struggle for her family restaurant against her aunt. Both of them embarked on a journey to learn to make nasi lemak, in the process, learn more about their culture. Meeting Baba Nyonya to learn sambal, Dato Arumugam to lean curry, and Afdlin Shauki to learn.... I dont know what he learn there except that having 4 wives is blissful. And of course, in the end he sort of won the competition-la.
First, the script is rather good. However, we kept being reminded that we are one in diversity, and the message of unity was sort of shoved down our throat every 15 minutes. Too obvious, like Jack neo's earlier work. The acting was alrite, considering that Namewee is playing himself. Like how you would expect to see him in his youtube ranting. Karen Kong however, surprise, have a certain talent in playing her character of a kind hearted girl. The irony of it, both of them were famous because of youtube: Karen for her self made singing-while-playing-piano video (hey, I was one of the earlier people who followed her on youtube); Namewee for his great anti-establishment politically incorrect song.
The jokes? some are quiet lame, I still have nightmare recalling the belly of a certain dark colour man whom the face we never see. Some are rather vulgar (the villain of the show is call LAN QIAO, understand, LANQIAO?) , bordering perverted. (how the perpetual action mimicking masturbation was used more than once). Some, on the other hand was genius. Although it is a movie of unity in diversity, there are LOTS of jokes with reference to the political scene. "it may look like me, sound like me, but is not me" quotes to the reference of political parties in the judging scene. Even the action involving certain ancient weapon was shown here. It was fun trying to spot all these reference, and it sort of involving the whole cinema as someone who suddenly shouted out when he/she finally got the jokes. And, if you are a Namewee fan like me, there are more reference to himself, especially the video of him complaining after a blackout. Of course, there are the usual reference to typical Malaysian from the amazing facebook usage, our rubbish throwing habit, our beloved national car with the window issues but air-con that bring north pole to malaysia, and our manglish.
It had been a fun ride. Namewee has proved to us, he is able to laugh at himself, and still stand firm. He tried, real hard to make us believe that we can be one in our diversity, but yet poke fun at the political scene which also tried hard to make us believe in the same thing. It brings to one thing, we can be one in our diversity, sometimes, it is the politicking, despite what their unity slogan is, that drives us apart.
ratings: 3 poink!
comments: it is still far from perfect, but since I am a Namewee's fan, this is still a great movie made under a small budget, without any assistance from the government. The song, is bordering great, cant imagine they really did a Indian Chinese song...
ps. trivial fact, Namewee did have a documentary in youtube before he got famous, about his hometown Muar, so he is not exactly new in movie making.
