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"White on Rice." (Photo courtesy of San Diego Asian Film Festival)
Fans of “White on Rice,” the San Diego Asian Film Festival’s Audience Award winner, scrambled to their seats to see the movie’s local theatrical premiere, followed by an amusing and eye-opening Q&A with director Dave Boyle (”Big Dreams Little Tokyo”) and actors Hiroshi Watanabe and Nae Tazawa.
Saturday’s audience had a chance to ask the cast and crew all sorts of questions, including what it was like to work in the sweltering weather of Salt Lake City for 35 days and what it was like to eat lots of hamburgers.
Coming from the war film “Letters from Iwo Jima,” lead actor Watanabe talked about his transition to comedy.
“As an actor, I work really hard. It doesn’t matter [if I'm working on a] big-budget project or not-so-big budget project,” he said. “But, food was different. When I work in ‘Letters from Iwo Jima,’ it was [with] Warner Bros., so I could eat lobster. Like all-you-can-eat. But this one, the beginning was pretty good, but it was getting worse and worse. We always eat hamburger, so you can see me getting fatter and fatter.”
Offscreen, Watanabe seemed to have a quirky and unpredictable sense of humor that’s similar to that of his onscreen character, Jimmy Beppu - a 40-year-old divorcee who lives in his sister’s basement with his genius nephew and disastrously chases after women, particularly his brother-in-law’s niece, in order to replace his ex-wife.
Like Jimmy, Watanabe is fond of dinosaurs. But Watanabe assured the audience that there’s an important difference between the actor and the character he portrays: “[Jimmy] is a kind of a loser. But don’t worry, I’m not like him.”
Boyle talked about the inspiration for the film, which sprouted from his own fear of having an unpromising future as an unemployed filmmaker, dependent on his sister for food and shelter.
“My sister is a wedding florist, like Yuki Nae’s character [who plays the sister of Hajime],” Boyle explained. “I lived in her basement for a long time and I was worried I would never get out.”
Boyle has watched the movie more than 25 times in public screenings: “The audience is very receptive…The kids like the humor and the older crowd enjoys the sweetness of the film.”
Movie-goer Ciani Palencia, a member of the “older crowd,” said she was “intrigued by the content. The comedy was unique and the dialogue was witty. You couldn’t predict what was happening. It was not your typical happy ending — I totally did not expect it, but I was satisfied.”
San Diego is the tenth city in which the romantic comedy has opened. You can see “White on Rice” at Reading Cinemas Gaslamp 15, 701 Fifth Avenue; (619) 232-0401. Click here for showtimes and tickets.
The film will also be premiering in cities across the United States and Canada. For locations, click here.
Want to check out the trailer? Here it is:
Regina Ip is an SDNN contributor.
Tags: Audience Award, Dave Boyle, Hiroshi Watanabe, Letters from Iwo Jima, Nae Tazawa, Regina Ip, San Diego Asian Film Festival, SDNN
