Rosemead ☆☆☆☆ 1/2

Starring: Lucy Liu and
Lawrence Shou

Directed by: Eric Lin

he time has come for Lucy Liu to receive the recognition she deserves from The Academy. If Rosemead and her performance in it do not get any attention come awards season, then something is well and truly amiss. Quite possibly the most devastating and affecting film of the year, it holds a mirror up to modern America and its many societal failings, offering a bleak picture of how decent, ordinary people’s struggles lead to the most tragic of downfalls, one way or another. This is one of those movies that you hope will cause people to sit up and listen, and recognise the awfulness that is all around them. Sadly, that will probably not prove to be the case outside the world of movies, because the America truly is in apocalyptic times, but if anything, we need movies like Rosemead more than ever, just to prove that there is some humanity out there, and that our capacity for compassion will never be dampened, no matter how terrible things get.

Irene (Liu) is a widowed Chinese immigrant living in Los Angeles with her seventeen-year-old son Joe (Lawrence Shou), who is struggling increasingly with schizophrenia. They have a close bond, and in many ways seem to be each other’s only source of joy and true safety in an unfair world. Irene is a hard-working business owner who spends her free time helping out in her friends’ shops, and she has cancer, with an experimental treatment only providing an inkling of hope that she will see her son grow to adulthood. But Joe’s illness is worsening, and he is having frightening episodes that indicate that something is very wrong. He shuts himself away in an effort to outrun the voices and terrible hallucinations that plague him, and in his isolation, he begins to spiral into more defensive measures.

There is a sickening moment around halfway through the movie when the audience and Irene simultaneously realise what is happening: Joe is on the fast track to becoming one of America’s most dreadful statistics. He’s going to commit a mass shooting. From here, the movie has an oppressive weight to it, assuring you that some tragic conclusion is bound to be reached, it’s just a matter of how far the carnage will spread. This movie is crushing in its tragedy, and its opening title card that proclaims it as based on a true story serves as a chilling reminder that this is the furthest thing from Hollywood fiction that one can find. It dares to lift the veil on the origins of people who go on to posthumous infamy and examine the many awful variables of life that take them to that fate.

Before Joe’s destiny as a bringer of death is established, there are glimpses of serenity in Rosemead that focus on his relationship with his mother, and with a few close friends. He is haunted by the death of his father, and attends weekly therapy with a Chinese psychologist, played by James Chen, to try and tackle the trauma. Despite his illness, Joe is a good, normal kid: a decorated competitive swimmer, with a decent circle of friends who get up to just the right amount of teenage hijinks, and a materially comfortable upbringing. But a great performance from Shou, working in tandem with stunning editing, cinematography and sound design, gives us a clear perspective of what it is like to live in Joe’s mind. It’s a dark, troubling and desperately lonely place, where shadowy figures and oppressive voices stalk him and unlike in the streets, there is nowhere for him to run. On the cusp of his 18th birthday, it is emphasised just how close Joe is to being considered a criminal rather than the sufferer of an illness. A run-in with the law sees officers tell Irene that once he hits adulthood, she officially loses her hold on him, and he becomes fodder for the LAPD to mistreat.

“This movie is crushing in its tragedy, and its opening title card that proclaims it as based on a true story serves as a chilling reminder that this is the furthest thing from Hollywood fiction that one can find. It dares to lift the veil on the origins of people who go on to posthumous infamy and examine the many awful variables of life that take them to that fate. Rosemead is an absorbing and thoroughly heartbreaking movie that deals blow after grievous blow to its audience and Lucy Liu is just astounding. Director Eric Lin knocks it out of the park with this utterly devastating drama, which manages so carefully to avoid hysterics, stereotyping or scaremongering.”

Meanwhile, a visit to a local gun shop is a disgusting reminder of America’s obsession with the Second Amendment. Irene goes there to ask if the proprietor has seen her son, and to warn him not to sell any firearms to the young man. The man behind the counter breezes past her concerns, however, and starts presenting her with options for her to buy, imploring her to hold the guns, feel their weight and realise how perfect they are for her, as if they were toys rather than devastating weapons of destruction. Between the law’s overzealous attitude towards criminalising mental illness and the firearms industry’s eagerness to make a sale and uphold God-given rights, a ticking time bomb is constructed, and we, along with Irene, sink into ourselves, terrified of the inevitable boom.

Irene and Joe’s Chinese heritage is a central fixture of the movie, which goes to great lengths to demonstrate the discrepancy between the family’s cultural background and the scientific and legal attitudes of America. Irene usually speaks Mandarin to her son, who only ever responds in English. Extended family members whisper about Joe, worrying that psychiatric medications will “fry his brain,” and that the real issue is a curse that should be cured with tinctures and mantras. A poignant line to the psychologist reminds him that just because he is also Chinese doesn’t mean that he understands this particular family unit. Cultural heritage may be an important influence, but it doesn’t produce a homogeneous race that all think, act and emote the same. All the while, Irene does her best to appease her family, stay true to how she sees the world, and ensure that her son won’t harm himself or others, but it becomes an increasingly hopeless uphill battle.

Director Eric Lin knocks it out of the park with this utterly devastating drama, which manages so carefully to avoid hysterics, stereotyping or scaremongering. His direction feels reminiscent of Catherine Hardwicke’s in Thirteen, with the movie’s emotional core being split between mother and son, never wanting to side with one and always aiming to be understanding of their respective struggles.

Rosemead is an absorbing and thoroughly heartbreaking movie that deals blow after grievous blow to its audience and Lucy Liu is just astounding. The final five minutes of the movie are likely the hardest you’ve watched on a screen in some time, and it is so just that a story of this magnitude and seriousness is given such proper treatment. Its atmosphere wraps you up in its sad world, with every single element of filmmaking coming together in perfect synchronicity to put you on those tormented L.A. streets where something devastating is about to happen.

– Courtesy: Collider.com