Overrated and overhyped

Charming and brutal

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

.........................................................from Pasto,Colombia...Via: L.A. CA., CALI, COLOMBIA....and ORLANDO, FL ....And this ONE really has Cinema Verite written ALL over it! You never know exactly what to expect next. But, for the most part, nothing DOES ever really happen...and that, in the case of TAKE OUT, is a GOOD thing, believe me. Perhaps a bit cryptic and difficult to decipher at times, but I think that's because, culturally speaking, many Chinese Nationals seem to be a bit difficult to read! Surprisingly, in the Special Features "Making-of" short, we learn that most of the cast are simply PORTRAYING characters from the Mainland. Of course, SOME of them really are, but most are Korean-American, Taiwanese, Malaysian, Chinese-American and Singaporean, ALL of whom speak perfect Mandarin. Wow! Sure fooled me! A more accurate title might have been: "Chinese TAKE OUT Delivery Boy: A Day In The LIFE...or E-C Comah, E-C Goah!" If this zero budget film hadn't been executed with such overwhelmingly brutal and convincing precision, it most certainly would've been rated .75 to 1 full * less! From early on, my empathy with those on-screen was total and unwavering! They had me at "Sut- Tzun Tee-En-Hwah!" At one point I actually said to myself, "Hey, they just followed this delivery boy around all day with a camera, that's why ALL this seems so REAL, because it IS REAL!" I consider myself a peace-loving person, but my identification with the characters in the film became so strong, that during one scene of injustice, I yearned for a gun to shoot the bad guys myself! TAKE OUT does shine a spotlight on some important realities. It shows us how new arrivals are forced into a life of virtual slavery by bottom-feeders who trap them into a never-ending cycle of loans with astronomical interest- rates. Hey, you think YOU have problems!? Closing note: Considering the 3K budget, the production values aren't all that bad. Talk about getting a LOT of BANG for your BUCK! Your best bet...Let TAKE OUT serve you up a slice of Chinese-immigrant life! 8*.....ENJOY/DISFRUTELA! Any comments, questions or observations, in English o en Español, are most welcome!

The movie is shot so realistically I thought I was watching a documentary. The movie follows a day in the life of a Chinese food delivery boy, and all the difficulties that this line of work entails. The twist here is that this delivery boy is an illegal immigrant and has a significant debt to repay. I was surprised to see how difficult this line of work really is, and never really thought about the stories of the people who are doing this work. I wonder how many others delivery boys are in the same situation as the character in this film. There are times of heartfelt camaraderie between the workers of the Chinese restaurant, each willing to help the other out in times of greatest need. I certainly will be more generous with my tipping after having seen this film.

This film has no frills, but it doesn't need any. It's redolent of the authentic gritty milieu of a Chinese illegal who's got to get together $800 before the night's over to pay loan sharks by borrowing and delivering for a Chinese take out shop perched on the cusp between Harlem's projects and gentrified buildings all on a June day of pouring down rain. There's no time to breathe. The people are real. The external customers who come into the shop (some of them jokesters) are aspiring actors, but the apartment dwellers are opening their own doors. The lady taking the orders who they call Big Sister (Lee Wang-Thye) is the actual employee of the working restaurant that's in function in the location implied as the film is being shot. The rain is real. The anxiety feels real. What more do you need? Ming Ding (Charles Jang) is a pimply young father with a child he's never seen. He gets waked up early in the dormitory he sleeps in to get threatened and smashed with a hammer. The two men working for the loan shark take $800 he has saved and demand another $800 at the end of the day.At work, Ming Ding is shyly noncommittal but his co-delivery guy Young (Jeng-Hua Yu), who was where he was four years earlier, worms out of him that he's in debt and lets Ming Ding take both their deliveries that day to raise his take. The essence of this film is that given the threatening situation, the viewer identifies all the more with the protagonist precisely because of his blankness and ineloquence. It is an aspect of his helplessness. And when Ming Ding makes his many deliveries he does not speak, even to smile and say "Thank you very much" as Young comically teaches him to do so he might get a better tip. He speaks no English, and this is a further dimension of his helplessness. The viewer too is helpless. We can't really see the money being exchanged clearly enough at the deliveries to know when Ming Ding is getting a tip and when he isn't. What we know is that the patrons are rarely pleasant and always hasty. For them, above all Ming Ding is a non-person.Some who've commented on this feisty little film insist the plot "hook" is a formality and the aim is to depict the illegal-immigrant life or the low-level Chinese restaurant of New York City. That ignores that the detail is monotonous and repetitious; its effectiveness comes from suspense over whether Ming Ding will put together enough money. The uncertainty is the most essential aspect of the atmosphere and the most realistic.In fact contemporary verismo or not, this is very much like the turn-of-the-century short stories of O.Henry, which often refer to the lives of the dirt-poor new immigrants of New York of an earlier era. Like many O. Henry characters, Ming Ding lives on the edge of life and death, poverty and exhaustion, and the story hinges on a last minute twist, a couple of them; the luck of the draw, a stupid mistake, a sudden access of kindness from an unexpected quarter. Of such things lives on the edge are made. Yes, we see the first twist coming, and the second one too is well set up, but that's how life-or-death short stories have to work. In this kind of story, whether by O. Henry or Baker and Tsou, the almost too tight construction of the narrative and the desperate exigencies of the protagonist's situations are friends to each other, and Baker and Tsou, who met at the New School, have made a little marvel of economy. Their scenario was dictated by the newcomers they encountered and Tsou, a Chinese speaker, spoke to everybody and even where the undocumented ones were concerned about anonymity, they weren't tight-lipped like Ming Ding. Tsou would like this film to be seen in China to show people the life of immigrants in America is much harder than they may think.Seen at Quad Cinema June 13, 2008, where Baker and Tsou were present for a Q&A afterward. They are excited that five years after making the film, they are getting the audience contact of theatrical distribution.

Directors Sean Baker and Shih-Ching Tsou outdo themselves with their tale which is about much more than the sum of its parts. Excellent performances from professionals and non-professionals highlight this story of one young immigrant's struggle to survive in a country that doesn't care what state he is in, they just want their deliveries on time. Please seek this out and see what can be done with no money and a lot of talent. This story could be done 'Hollywood' style, with its crucial deadlines and world pressing in on Ming Ding(the lead), but it doesn't need to rely on overmanipulative scores, frenetic editing or artificial suspense..the way it's laid out will keep you on edge as it is.