Shopping for Fangs (1997, USA)

Justin Lin’s first film (together with Quentin Lee) shows all the hallmarks of an overly ambitious couple of film school grads on their first project, along with the newborn legacy of another Quentin – Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction has its fingerprints all over Fangs. The film follows several young Asian-American Angelinos as their paths cross during their explorations of – what else – identity and sexuality. Phil thinks he might be turning into a werewolf, or is it merely the side effects of too much testosterone and bad luck with the ladies? Katherine confides in her shrink about her failing marriage and the weird waitress who seems to be stalking her. The waitress, Trinh, makes friends with a lonely young gay man (John Cho, in his first film) and talks endlessly of her love for Katherine.

Obviously, the whole thing is more than a little overwrought, and it completely loses the thread in the last twenty minutes or so, but the first hour is actually quite entertaining, if not a little silly. It seems as if the first-film plague of trying to prove how smart they are handicap Lin and Lee’s efforts. Similarly, the film’s visual style is striking at times, but a little too schizophrenic in general. But it's easy to see how Lin jumped from this to Better Luck Tomorrow and his more recent Hollywood projects.