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'Combination Platter'
By David Mills
Washington Post Staff Writer
January 21, 1994
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It would be impossible to argue that you must, MUST! go out of your way to see "Combination Platter," a small independent film about a Chinese restaurant in Queens. Even by the standard of small independent films, "Combination Platter" isn't exactly thrill-packed. Two of its more dramatic scenes involve a waiter who's been caught filching tips and a surly takeout customer demanding his money back.Still, this first feature by Tony Chan -- whose parents actually own the Szechuan Inn in Queens -- offers a series of pleasant moments and quiet insights, as well as a larger lesson for makers of larger films: "Combination Platter" reveals the artistic folly of Hollywood's traditional instinct to tell stories about nonwhite cultures through the eyes of white characters. Chan, by competently employing basic techniques of narrative filmmaking, allows a non-Chinese audience to empathize with his Chinese characters, to the degree that we sit there annoyed and amused by the pageant of American fusspots, loudmouths and doofuses who keep the joint in business. At the center of the story is Robert, an undocumented immigrant from Hong Kong. While waiting tables, Robert seeks to marry a U.S. citizen so he can stay in the country legally. As portrayed by stockbroker and amateur actor Jeff Lau, Robert is decent and earnest and instantly likable. Even so, by the movie's climax -- a raid by immigration officials -- it may surprise you to realize how much you care about him. Chan's camera follows Robert frantically around and around the restaurant's basement as he looks for someplace, anyplace to hide. It is a moment of simple, genuine suspense. Chan surrounds Robert with an interesting mix of characters. His street-smart buddy Andy (Kenneth Lu), who is helping him find a wife, seems especially hip when he's speaking in New Yawk-inflected English. Lester "Chit-Man" Chan brings scowling authenticity to the part of Sam, the grumpy waiter who likes to insult his American customers in Chinese, right in front of their faces. Colleen O'Brien is touching as a shy white woman who goes out with Robert, unaware of his need for a marriage of convenience. Theirs becomes an unusual screen relationship. Their dates are uneventful; they don't have much to say together that matters; yet they continue to see each other because, well, it beats being alone. The multilingual dialogue in "Combination Platter" (with occasional English subtitles) also examines various cultural conflicts among the Chinese -- between immigrants and "ABCs" (American-born Chinese), between those who speak Cantonese and those who speak Mandarin. With storytelling ambitions roughly proportional to his $250,000 budget, Tony Chan has managed to produce an engaging little slice of life. "Combination Platter" is not rated but contains profanity in several languages.
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