The strictness of the laws in Singapore always seemed like a great starting point for local movies, and Los Angeles-based Siyou Tan seems to have the ideal distance from the country to be able to implement an aspect of this concept in her latest film, which premiered in Locarno a few days ago.
“Strawberry Cheesecake” is screening in Locarno Film Festival
Smoking and vaping in Singapore is forbidden, and thus, that is exactly what the three high school students that are the protagonists of the short, are doing in the roof of their school, while indulging in another all-time, teenage favorite, bad-mouthing their school principal, even going as far as pretending of shooting her with a sniper rifle, courtesy of watching a lot of Hollywood movies most probably. Their joy, however, does not last for long, since the aforementioned “target” actually catches them, and a heavy punishment is lurking over their heads the way only things that are certain do. Instead of kowtowing however, the three girls decide to exact their final revenge on authority, as they prove that sniping is not the only thing they picked up from watching American movies.
The most impressive aspect of the movie is the way Siyou Tan manages to incorporate such a number of different genres in just 9 minutes, while retaining a rather harmonic transition from one to another, with Armiliah Aripin's editing helping the most in that regard. As such, the film begins as a teenage drama of sorts, then it transforms into a revenge horror/thriller, before it is revealed as a comedy, concluding the title in the most entertaining way, through a plot twist of meta proportions.
Apart from the aforementioned elements, “Strawberry Cheesecake” (actually a vaping flavour) also thrives due to Shyan Tan's cinematography, with the two different portrayals of the school and the roof in particular, being just as artful as the night scenes on the street, where the SFX and the make up aspects also thrive. Lastly, the chasing scene emerges as the embodiment of all the aforementioned aspects, as it combines agony, horror, and a palpable sense that something is going very wrong in an audiovisually impressive package.
“Strawberry Cheesecake” is an impressive short that manages to offer much entertainment through a rather artful genre mashup.
