MOVIE REVIEW : Shum’s ‘Double Happiness’ Glows With Subtle Notes

Korean Canadian actress Sandra Oh lights up the screen in “Double Happiness,” Mina Shum’s lively, astringent, semi-autobiographical comedy about the travails of asserting one’s independence within an ultra-conservative Asian emigre family. In Oh’s quizzical, quicksilver personality Shum has found a perfect match for her own mercurial style, and the result is a first feature of much charm and painful truths.

Shum begins on a light note as she acquaints us with Oh’s Jade Li, the 22-year-old elder daughter of Chinese parents (Alannah Ong, Stephen Chang) who came from Hong Kong to settle in Vancouver. Jade seems irrepressible at first, initially laughing off matchmaking attempts from her parents and a go-between, her employer at a costume rental company. She also fends off less-than-encouraging parental remarks on her struggle to become an actress.

Ever so gradually, however, Shum tightens the screws, getting serious without losing her sense of humor. As the pressure upon Jade to marry increases we come to realize how schizoid Jade’s existence really is. When she deftly changes a C to an A to give her younger sister Pearl (Frances You) a straight-A report card to present to their father, Jade is actually marking the beginning of revealing how much of her life is a lie.

Outside home she’s freewheeling, liberated and ambitious, yet when she returns she finds herself reverting to the dutiful traditional Chinese daughter role with her parents, most especially to her ultra-strict father.

Jade’s know-it-all father may surprise us by unbending enough to lip-sync “MacArthur Park” in a convivial moment, but it increasingly becomes clear that he is fully prepared to break his daughter’s spirit while believing unquestioningly that he’s doing it for her own good. Truly, Jade is in deep conflict: She loves and respects her parents, doesn’t want to hurt them for the world, yet desperately wants to live her own life and knows full well just how high the price could be for trying to do so.

Shum deserves high marks for both fairness and subtlety in her most satisfying, beautifully acted and crafted film. Jade’s parents really are loving, do want the best for her and are rightly concerned about their daughter’s chances of successfully pursuing a career as an actress. Besides, the young lawyer (Andrew Chau) they’re eager to have her marry is exceptionally handsome and polished.

By the same token, Shum speaks volumes simply by following up the father’s brief recollection of living in a house full of servants as a child in pre-revolutionary China with a later glimpse of him returning home in his security guard’s uniform. “Double Happiness” brims with such telling details and sly touches, and it finally belongs to Sandra Oh, who by the time the film is over, has emerged as an actress as formidable as she is funny.

* MPAA rating: PG-13 for one scene of sexuality and brief strong language. Times guidelines: The film is a mature, thoughtful work beneath its humor and as such is suitable for teens .

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‘Double Happiness’ Sandra Oh: Jade Li Alannah Ong: Mom Li Stephen Chang: Dad Li Frances You: Pearl Li A Fine Line Features presentation. Writer-director Mina Shum. Producers Steve Hegyes, Rose Lam Waddell. Cinematographer Peter Wunstorf. Editor Alison Grace. Costumes Cynthia Summers. Music Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet. Production designer Michael Bjornson. Art directors Candice Dickens, Jill Haras. Set decorator Francois Milly. Running time: 1 hour, 27 minutes.

* At selected theaters.