Dim Sum – A Little Bit Of Heart
Picture: C+
Sound: C+ Extras: C+ Film: B-
Wayne Wang made such an impact with his classic Chan Is
Missing (reviewed elsewhere on this site) that a follow-up was not going to
be easy. Dim Sum – A Little Bit Of
Heart (1985) trades black and white for color and some of the sharper
points of the previous film for some melodrama, something that would become
more so in Wang’s later hit The Joy Luck Club. Fortunately, this film is deeply interested in once again showing
a story about the Chinese-American community like no film before had.
The story is about a mother-daughter relationship and how
old values and a new way of life cause conflict. The mother (Kim Chew) believes she is fated to die and her
daughter Geraldine (Laureen Chew) will marry the wrong person and not retain
any of the values and traditions she brought over from China, increasing the
feelings of dread and death.
Fortunately, enough of the story and supporting characters do not allow
this to drop into outright melodrama because this is not the typical “1980s
happy family/everything is going to be fine” phony mall movies we kept getting
over and over again until a new dysfunction formed across the country. Terrel Seltzer’s screenplay is not bad and
is rare in this genre for accomplishing anything, but the film is over all
unsatisfying despite taking us places we have never been with people we have
never met before. It is still worth a
look or revisit, as is the short included in the extras.
The letterboxed 1.85 X 1 image is not bad and has its
moments of good color, but based on the good print, the definition would have
been better if this were an anamorphic presentation. The Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono shows its age and is not any better or
worse than Chan Is Missing.
Extras include the Dim Sum – Take Out short that was made as a
follow-up to the feature, an introduction to the short, trailers for other Koch
Lorber DVDs and an interview with star Laureen Chew.
- Nicholas Sheffo
