Sometimes it seems that all the intelligent story-telling in film today is done by independents and short films, and that's certainly true of this short.
This is an unusually well-done character study, centered on Chinese-American businessman Michael Lin (Ben Wang), an out-of-towner visiting New York along with several other members of his company for a diversity meeting before going out for dinner as a group. As the only Asian at the meeting, he feels isolated at first, but he perks up when Anne Weisman (Sam Tsao), a Jewish Chinese-American attorney for the company arrives late for the meeting. But she immediately makes it clear that she has a different agenda, and she does not identify with him or her Asian heritage. After several attempts by him to engage her in friendly conversation, she rudely brushes him off and pointedly ignores him when they go to the bar.
Michael proceeds to get very drunk, and begins to behave boorishly. He eventually storms out of the bar, and while walking around the complex, strips his shirt off in mid-winter and in his drunken rage, enacts vestiges of his Chinese heritage.
I don't want to spoil the ending by giving it away, but it's surprising and sad. This short is well worth watching.
This is an unusually well-done character study, centered on Chinese-American businessman Michael Lin (Ben Wang), an out-of-towner visiting New York along with several other members of his company for a diversity meeting before going out for dinner as a group. As the only Asian at the meeting, he feels isolated at first, but he perks up when Anne Weisman (Sam Tsao), a Jewish Chinese-American attorney for the company arrives late for the meeting. But she immediately makes it clear that she has a different agenda, and she does not identify with him or her Asian heritage. After several attempts by him to engage her in friendly conversation, she rudely brushes him off and pointedly ignores him when they go to the bar.
Michael proceeds to get very drunk, and begins to behave boorishly. He eventually storms out of the bar, and while walking around the complex, strips his shirt off in mid-winter and in his drunken rage, enacts vestiges of his Chinese heritage.
I don't want to spoil the ending by giving it away, but it's surprising and sad. This short is well worth watching.