Pays : Singapour
Genre : Drame
Durée : 1h15
Date de sortie :
Avec : Francis Bosco, Jathishweran Naidu
Réalisateur : Eric KHOO
Depuis que sa femme l’a quitté, Francis est au bout du rouleau. Il travaille comme serveur dans une boite de nuit, et noie son chagrin dans l’alcool. Son fils de dix ans se débrouille seul, mais reproche à son père de se laisser aller. Par amour pour son enfant, Francis décide de renouer avec son ancien métier : magicien...
(L'avis exprimé par les rédacteurs de cette rubrique est indépendant du travail et des choix du Jury oecuménique.)
23 mai 2008
A modest 75 minute film for Cannes to acknowledge the small but active industry in Singapore.
The film opens with a large man in a bar continually asking for another drink. We glimpse a small boy forlorn in a shopping mall. Soon we learn that they are father and son, the son, an intelligent boy, has to care for his alcoholic father.
Because the father was once a magician who specialised in fakir-like magic in enduring piercings, beatings and broken glass, he gets an opportunity to make money for his son by enduring more and more tests of pain for a paying Chinese audience. (The magician and his son are both Tamil and speak Tamil.) The proprietor is interested in acts that ‘make the audience squirm’ – which is more than a bit the same for us as the cinema audience watching.
The boy longs for his departed mother. Finally, the father tells his son the truth about what happened and there is a pleasing fantasy touch to end the film.
Brief but telling, with a sense of humanity and a glimpse of Singapore.
