Actions Panel
Riceboy Sleeps - York Cinemania Screening
York Cinemania is back! Come and enjoy TIFF movies locally at the SilverCity Newmarket Cinema.
When and where
Date and time
Wednesday, April 26 · 7 - 8:57pm EDT
Location
SilverCity Newmarket Cinemas and XSCAPE Entertainment Centre 18195 Yonge Street East Gwillimbury, ON L9N 0H9 Canada
Refund Policy
About this event
- 1 hour 57 minutes
- Mobile eTicket
Riceboy Sleeps
CANADA, 2022
English, Korean
117 minutes
Principal Cast: Choi Seung-yoon, Dohyun Noel Hwang, Ethan Hwang, Anthony Shim
- Asian Filmmaker
- Coming of Age
- Critically Acclaimed
Summary:
In the 1990s, a young widow named So-young (Choi Seung-yoon) moves from South Korea to Canada with her young son, Dong-hyun (Dohyun Noel Hwang). Neither of them speaks English very well, or understands the cultures of their new home. But this is where they live now, where Dong-hyun will grow up, and they’ll make the best of it.
On paper, Riceboy Sleeps is a familiar semiautobiographical drama, the story of a smart kid trying to navigate new surroundings. But Vancouver director Anthony Shim distinguishes himself as a storyteller of piercing honesty and remarkable specificity, unpacking the lives of So-young and Dong-hyun over a decade of change and adaptation. (Dong-hyun is played as a teen by Ethan Hwang.)
Mother and son both experience different levels of casual racism at work and school, make unexpected alliances with co-workers and classmates, and slowly grow apart as they define themselves in a new Canadian context. When circumstances dictate a return to South Korea, it’s a home that Dong-hyun doesn’t even remember.
Riceboy Sleeps lays out its interwoven stories simply, shifting between the different perspectives of its protagonists. Poignantly capturing Dong-hyun’s loneliness and frustration alongside So-young’s isolation and sacrifices, Shim keeps the film compassionate and poetic, building to a final image that’s as lovely as it is shattering. Winner of TIFF 2022’s Platform Prize for its bold directorial vision, this film establishes...the presence of an important new Canadian filmmaker.
“[A]n affectionate, sharply-observed portrait of family life addressing wider issues of cultural identity, belonging and the challenges of the immigrant experience in 1990s Canada. It could almost be a companion piece to Lee Isaac Chung’s Minari.” –Allan Hunter, Screen Daily