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THE MOTEL
Directed & Written by: Michael Kang, based on the novel Waylaid by Ed Lin.
Produced by: Matthew Greenfield, Miguel Arteta, Gina Kwon & Karin Chien.
Director of Photography: Lisa Leone.
Edited by: Colleen Sharp & David Leonard.
Music by: Nathan Larson.
Released by: Palm Pictures/ImaginAsian Pictures.
Country of Origin: USA. 76 min. Not Rated.
With: Jeffrey Chyau, Sung Kang, Jade Wu, Samantha Futerman, Stephen Chen, Alexis Kapp Chang & Conor J. White.

Chubby second-generation Chinese-American Ernest (Jeffrey Chyau) toils day after day helping his scarily-stern mother (Jade Wu) run her sleazy by-the-hour motel. Never seen with a smile, she discourages her son from pursuing his passion for writing, claiming that he is no good at it. Living within a dark and sexually promiscuous environment – prostitutes are regulars at the run-down motel – pubescent Ernest suffers his share of confusion over his budding sexuality. (At one point, Ernest finds a porn magazine in one of the rooms he is cleaning, and later masturbates while he is working at the motel reception late at night.)

But what would otherwise be uncomfortable moments for the audience are made quite humorous, due in large part to Ernest’s dorkiness. Relatively short, he wears thick glasses and in his spare time lines up chunks of cheddar cheese, eating them five at a time. He is constantly made fun of by other kids because of his weight, ethnicity, and for his mother’s business. His crush on slightly older Christine (Samantha Futerman from Memoirs of a Geisha) renders Ernest all the more lovably pitiable.

Ernest changes somewhat dramatically with the arrival of sexually-charged Korean-American Sam (Sung Kang), a young man who regularly brings random women to his room. Also without friends, Sam befriends Ernest, who has no father figure in his life, and the odd duo become curiously dependent on each other, until Ernest, in a slightly unbelievable shift of character, changes his attitude toward Sam.

Though the particularly rigid relationship between Ernest and his mother appears to be a specific characteristic of Chinese culture, where children are generally not allowed much personal freedom, the film also extends beyond cultural specificity to address general growing pains, as seen from the perspective of a rather untraditional and endearing protagonist. The film ends abruptly but appropriately – not attempting to offer any happy-ending answers to the inevitable traumas of adolescence. Without condescending towards Ernest, The Motel simply tells it like it is. Parisa Vaziri
June 28, 2006