Malaysia has one of the highest rates of scam calls in the world, numbering over 90 million calls a year. Even with a population that's one third of that amount, the multilingual nature of Malaysians results in the nation being a massive contributor to that statistic. Tan Ce Ding takes a look at the phenomenon with his Orizzonti-premiering short, focusing though, not on the victims, but on the people who end up doing this kind of jobs.
Please Hold the Line is screening at Venice International Film Festival
A sleepy young employee is making scam calls following a specific script, eventually passing her “customers” to her supervisor, in an operation that seems to function exactly as phone marketing/sales. As soon as her time is up, she meets with a friend and colleague, who is supposed to let her know how and where she can have an abortion. A bit later on, her father, a taxi driver who thinks she works as an in-store promoter, picks her up, but is utterly offensive to her, essentially showing why the girl has not gone to him in order to ask for money for the abortion. However, since she cannot find the money to pay for the procedure, she ends up embezzling from the company she works for, a choice that, expectedly, does not go well for her.
Tan Ce Ding directs a short that provides an answer to the question, “who are the people working in scam calls?”, with his answer being double-fold. On the top of the food chain are people from organized crime, who seem to make millions. Further down, however, are just poor people who cannot find decent jobs or face issues that demand some quick money, with the protagonist obviously belonging to the second category. Through this particular presentation, Tan manages to avoid the reef of taking a moral stance and just highlighting the victims, instead showing a side of the concept very rarely seen on screen, in probably the best trait of the short.
Also of note is the way he creates a world in Malaysia, that seems to be dominated by people searching for hope through organized or petty crime, or through gambling, with the specific scam actually taking advantage of both, as much as the need of people for some sort of communication, one that frequently they cannot find in their homes. The protagonist's T-shirt, which has “Good Life” written on it, seems like an irony to the whole aforementioned setting, in a rather entertaining detail here. Lastly, the finale is also excellent, in a style that borders on tragic irony, but ends up showing that even scammers have a point they cannot go beyond.
Tan Ce Ding receives a great performance from Kendra Sow in the protagonist role, as she manages to exhibit her discomfort, angst, and inner turmoil with very few words. The scene with the car window, the only one she is required to really externalize her feelings, is the apogee of her effort.
Kenz Khor's 4:3-ratio cinematography captures the aforementioned setting with realism, without any exaltation, while Tan's own editing results in a relatively fast pace, that suits the narrative nicely. The cut to the violent scene especially, is particularly impactful.
“Please Hold the Line” is an excellent film that shows that 2022 is a great year for Asian short films.
