30 Aug 2006

Be With Me

Director: Eric Khoo

Starring: Theresa Chan Poh Lin, Ezann Lee, Samantha Tan, Seet Keng Yew, Chiew Sung Ching, Lawrence Yong, Lynn Poh

Screening: 2005-09-06

This the first quasi-dyke film in Singapore ever! Co-written and
directed by Singapore's most important director Eric Khoo, it stars
nubile actresses Ezann Lee and Samantha Tan as teenage girls who
meet each other in a lesbian chatroom and discover love. Using their
chatroom and SMS exchanges to convey their thoughts — instead
of actual dialogue — the film charts the entire course of
their relationship.


Be With Me weaves the lesbian romance with other stories
of people searching for love, such as a real-life blind and deaf
woman (Theresa Chan), a bereaved shopkeeper (Chiew Sung Ching) and
a lonely security guard (Seet Keng Yew). Each story is told with
simple characters and small incidents, silently observed and never
explained.


What's refreshing about Be With Me's depiction of lesbian
love is that it is so objective and unsentimental. There is neither
judgment on their relationship, nor an attempt to explain the motives
or psychology of two girls falling in love.


With this film, Eric Khoo has clearly made a quantum leap as an
artist. He shies away from the typical dramatic devices of telling
a story. Instead, he places his faith on the camera's ability to
quietly observe the scene and slowly reveal the drama. Some audiences
may get impatient with its very slow pace and lack of drama, while
others may revel in its purity and simplicity.