WATCH OUT!: 15 (2003)

Games
Music
Movies
- Reviews
- Articles
- TV
- Trailers
- Calendar
Downloads
Forums
About
- Site Blog
- Staff
- Jobs
- FAQ
- Archive

WATCH OUT!: 15 (2003)

Written by Arya Ponto

Sunday, 24 August 2008

One of the more fascinating aspects to watch in teen-gone-wrong movies is how each ethnic culture has their own view on rebellion. Though the catalysts and the repercussions are universal—it almost always involve gang violence, drugs, and blind-eyed parents—the way these teens carry themselves translate to each of them having their own unique stories to tell. In American movies, we typically see such disobedience end up with guns and death, as they like to portray teen gangbangers as just shorter versions of actual gangbangers. Royston Tan's 15, depicting the lives of teenage gangsters in Singapore, offers a portrait of the delinquent lifestyle that may seem tame and exotic to Western eyes, but it's in no way any less damaging to these individuals.

Starring a group of real-life 15-year-old outcasts playing themselves, 15 has no discernible plot. It simply follows these kids in their daily lives and adopts their attitude by presenting a manic film that uses a visual gimmick whenever it feels like it. Director Royston Tan likes to play around with camera tricks, which makes it even more shocking and unbearable when he simply lets his camera run documentary-style during the nasty scenes. I'm talking about scenes like kids cutting their arm with a box cutter, or when they're swallowing condoms stuffed with pills. We actually see this one boy stuff condom after condom into his mouth, eyes welling up, as Tan goes in for a close-up of him gagging, making it feel like the scene goes on for hours. But then Tan would randomly (and repeatedly thorughout the film) switch to a webcam POV of these menace-to-society punks practicing cheesy dance moves and chanting to house music, in what I can only describe as a cross between a gangsta rap video and a poem recital. It's just like Kids, if Larry Clark had collaborated with Baz Luhrmann.

15 is a hard movie to watch. It's extremely emo with its teenage angst and the story (or lack thereof) meanders a lot for no purpose, easily exhausting anyone watching it; but it's worth a look at least once, if only to get somewhat of a glimpse into a troubling life in this specific culture. While drug problems and rampant violence exist in all cultures, 15 gives little glimpses here and there on the issues boiling in the Singaporean underbelly. A gang war can ignite simply because some Singaporean kids have adopted English (or their more unique Singlish, to be exact) as their main language, while others—considered less educated—still speak Mandarin and Hokkien. Then there's the culture's pressure-cooker outlook on education, allowing something as innocent as bad exam scores to cause these teens to be kicked out of their homes, or even commit suicide. Or, slightly less dramatic, there's even something very foreign in how strangers would approach and exchange phone numbers with each other simply because they happen to be playing hooky on the same day.

It's not to say that this type of stuff is the norm in Singapore, but it's something that more or less captures the gritty feeling of what's behind the country's squeaky-clean image. The best sequence in the movie is when one of our main characters wishes to commit suicide and searches for he perfect building to jump from. This dark moment suddenly turns into a travelogue montage showcasing Singapore's best architectural accomplishments—an amusing juxtaposition, to say the least. Most interesting, perhaps, is how 15 is labeled as a gay coming-of-age movie outside of Singapore, due to the very heavy homo-eroticism between the male kids' close brotherhood within a gang, even though the film only intends to show young men desperate to know love (the familial, not the romantic, kind), and only finding it in their comrades. Much like the often misinterpreted shower kiss in Gus Van Sant's Elephant.

In cinema verite fashion, Tan shoots these kids piercing their mouths or getting tattoos, in such a believable fashion that it starts to feel like home videos of the debauched. This kind of explicit depiction, coupled with the general hooligan view of Singapore led to the banning of the film and a subsequent, heavily edited version released under an R rating in Singapore. The censorship inspired Royston Tan to make Cut, a satirical film criticizing the Singapore Film Censors Board. Picture This! Entertainment gave 15 a US release and the film is available on both Blockbuster Online and Netflix.

Watch Out! is a feature on JustPressPlay where Arya Ponto showcases lesser-known, lesser-appreciated and often bizarre small films that are cool and deserve to get some attention.