Dream Land (Steven Chen, 2015): USA, Cambodia

Reviewed by Jessie Su. Viewed at Fiesta 1, Santa Barbara International Film Festival 2016.

Did I really spend 90 minutes listening to a woman complain about her relationship? This is one of the most boring films I have ever watched. Sometimes just for fun, my friends and I would pick out the worse film we could find and watch it. We choose Leprechaun in the Hood, and sadly, I enjoyed it more than Dream Land. I’ll give credit to the beautiful scenery and architecture director Steven Chen shot, but come on!  At least give us an interesting story.

Steven Chen holds a Master’s Degree in Architecture from Princeton University. I felt like he spent more time finding beautiful architecture than writing this screenplay. Chen starts off with a medium shot that is straight on at a side angle of Lida, played by Lida Duch, as she is driving. This is not the only shot we see of her driving. There are at least three repeats of just filming her driving to work or home and nothing else. She works as a real estate agent selling beautiful villas and property. How convenient! Steven Chen is an architect. Lida sells happiness to others, yet does not have happiness herself.

She is conflicted with her deteriorating relationship with her photographer boyfriend, Hak, played by Hak Kim. It is believed that Hak has cheated on her in the past, and now he is more than friends with other women.

While she is showing a client a house, one of the books she bought earlier drops. The child who tagged along finds it, and she explains how she reads romance novels because she can’t sleep. Later on, she complains endlessly about her insomnia to Hak. It is so boring that even Hak does not listen.

Steve Chen finds it necessary to shoot Lida doing her job again and again. Yet, even Chen finds it dull and insignificant, so he blurs the picture. Chen shows how Lida and her co-workers like partying and singing karaoke. The songs chosen for karaoke seem to always be about love.

A scene secretly suggests how discontent she is with Hak’s behavior. While Hak is photographing the models, the film cuts to Lida’s emotionless face while he says “sexy! sexy! Bend over.” Right afterwards, it cuts to flashing lights of nothing but a white background.

The only positive thing about this movie is that it showed beautiful architecture and how beautiful Cambodia is. Dream Land lacked a good plot, story and drama. It had no excitement, humor or pleasure. I was wondering how much longer until the movie ends the whole time. The boring plot made it easier to look at the beautiful scenery, but the complaining of Lida made it irritating and frustrating. If he has cheated on her before and is cheating again, now then just end the relationship!