It’s been a while since I last wrote about any movie on the blog, and even longer since I watched any local movie on the big screen, but last night I went to the cinema and caught Nasi Lemak 2.0, and you should too.
Nasi Lemak 2.0 is directed by Namewee, a name that should be familiar with every youtube generation that resides in Malaysia, his is (in)famous for quite a few music videos – Negaraku-ku being the more prominent one.
I’ve always thought about Namewee as a person who has a talent and definitely passionate about the country. However, he also struck me as a person who sometimes uses his talent in not a particularly great way to voice out what he has to say.
This movie changes some of that perception for me.
Firstly, the plot (pulled from wikipidia, skip if you do not want/need any potential spoilers)
A young chef, Huang Da Xia (played by Wee Meng Chee) struggles to get his restaurant business going. The reason his restaurants rarely gets customers is because he cannot adapt to the “localized” cooking his patrons are looking for. However, contradicting his unpopular cuisine, he is also well-known as “Hero Huang” in the local neighborhood where he carries out good deeds in helping the community (e.g: Filming videos and putting them on his Youtube account.) until he met Xiao K (played byKaren Kong) who asked for his help. Xiao K’s father, owner of a famous chinese restaurant, is fighting with her aunt for the ownership of the restaurant. After some complicated discussions, they decided to hold a contest to see who can cook the best chinese dish. Desperate to get his life and the restaurant business back on track, Chef Huang decided to help Xiao K. Huang seeks help from a mysterious hawker stall lady (played by Adibah Noor), who summons him to embark on an extraordinary journey of his life. During this self-enlightening experience, he will also meet many “local heroes” each lending their support to help him re-discover his roots and the real hidden message of “Nasi Lemak”.
Nasi Lemak 2.0 is a comedy on the surface, but the heart of the movie touches on lives in Malaysia that most Malaysians can relate to. This is truly a 1Malaysia movie that is undoubtedly Malaysian and sends a strong message about our identity.
There were at least half a dozen languages used in the movie, and I’m quite sure that most everyone will have to read the subtitles somewhere along the way, so don’t feel bad if you don’t speak/understand Cantonese, Tamil, or even Malay, you will still get (most of) the jokes. Knowledge of current affair and political landscape of the country helps too (like the hidden meaning of “diam lah”).
Certain direction of the movie, such as the repeated “funny” actions of certain characters could have been done without, but otherwise Nasi Lemak 2.0 hits the spot pretty good, even with it’s ultra low budget and crap quality special effects.
If you haven’t catch the show yet, go watch it! I genuinely enjoy the movie and I believe most of you will too!