Publicity
Stills of
"Kallang Roar"
(Courtesy of Shaw)
Genre: Drama Director: Cheng Ding An Cast: Lim Kay Siu, Santhanaram Jayaram (Ram),
Leon Quah Hsun Chuen, Randall Tan, Anwar Hadi Bin Ramli, Melvinder
Kanth, Bhaskar Subramanian RunTime: 1 hr 28 mins Released By: Shaw Rating: PG Official Website:www.thekallangroarmovie.com
Battling the onslaught of a life threatening stage of diabetics,
an entire board of unsupportive officials ready to oust him,
a record of 12 years of Malaysian football supremacy, Uncle
Choo defiantly returns to Singapore football scene in 1977
for one last short at restoring Nationalistic pride.
Uncle
Choo was one unorthodox gem of a coach, regimental, courageous,
determined and very imposing. He was bold, quietly confident:
always believing that he and his nurtured team can accomplish
milestone though with limited resources in every department.
His undying love for the game and his role as a coach whom,
few will would ever understand.
Armed
with legendary players like Quah Kim Song, Rajagopal, Samad,
Mat Noh, Dollah Kassim, uncle sets out an impossible journey
to remind his fellow countrymen of what it meant to be Singaporean.
This
is a tale about sheer grit, unbreakable will and his deep
passion, unyielding struggle with society and oneself, to
finally achieve glory for one’s nation through football
and coined one legacy unwittingly, known to all as ‘The
Kallang Roar’ which is of nothing to himself at the
end of it.
Movie Review (A):
Cheng Ding An's attempt to paint a cinematic portrayal of
Singapore football's glory days of the 70s met with several
budget and production challenges but ultimately, the payoff
is undeniable. To see a local film effort celebrating arguably
the most popular sport in the nation is something particularly
appealing especially football fans. Sadly, if the film was
to be graded in terms of overall quality, it would resemble
more of the Singapore team of today. The results are always
somewhere there but somehow, something major - a defining
spirit - is missing. Set in the 70s “Kallang Roar”
feels like a soul-less portrayal that just fails to replicate
the true spirit of Singapore football's glory days.
From the start, its important to get a few points straight
for rabid football fans. The film is entirely based in the
1960s (briefly) and then the 1970s, so unless you are a well
read Singapore fan who revels in stories from your parents,
the youth of today probably will not feel particularly connected
to the film. “Kallang Roar” also uses no footage
of real matches. The film entirely depends on football seemingly
played by the actors themselves, so you'll see Randall Tan
dribbling as Mat Noh (somewhat abysmally) and disappointingly
CG-ed scenes of Edmund Wee saving queer shots in front of
goal.
For a film to revolve around the excitement of football action
and the Cup winning effort of 1977, there has to be football
action. Not just football action, but real, quality football
action. “Goal” did an excellent job, giving lead
character Kuno Becker proper skills training and shooting
excellent, in game footage featuring actual stars as well
as lookalikes, merged with real footage from actual games.
This despite “Goal” being an imaginary story,
albeit featuring real teams. “Kallang Roar” is
a dramatically presented documentary, which made it even more
critical to feature authentic footage. The unfortunate lack
of real footage left me sitting almost anxiously at the edge
of my seat waiting for real footage right to the disappointing
end. The re-enacted football, meanwhile, though brave in terms
of effort, bordered on the embarrassing.
For all accounts and purposes, “Kallang Roar”
seemed like a dream cobbled together crippled by a large degree
of expediency. The lack of footage meant the team's entire
season was presented by fleeting CG footage of flashing newspaper
headlines of results, right up to until the semi-finals. By
then, the soul of the film is decidedly empty. Couldn't some
effort be made to locate at least some of the remaining, living
former stars to make a cameo appearance? Even the use of someone
like V. Sundramoorthy, however irrelevant, would have done
much to save the movie.
Lim Kay Siu, arguably the less prominent of the Lim brothers,
does well in a film that required him to carry it solely with
his performance - just as Kay Tong did admirably in “Perth”.
Despite occasional lapses into a tendency to over dramatise
in certain scenes, Kay Siu grasped the strong-headed, idealistic
and never say die spirit of the late Uncle Choo Seng Quee
really well.
Kay Siu, however, was surrounded by a decidedly wooden portrayal
of N Ganesan and a strangely dramatic and unjustifiably mean
board director who keeps trying to keep Uncle Choo from the
job because he lacks "qualifications" (When he has
coached Malaysia and Indonesia into champions prior).The acting
by the cast was on the whole earnest but not up to mark. The
only positive moment was an excellent jibe, through Trevor
Hartley's character, at how Singapore always fails to trust
and depend on local talent, instead sometimes blindly finding
security in foreign "talent". Leon Quah, the son
of legend Quah Kim Song, was sadly disappointing in an entirely
dead and uninspiring rendition of his father, though its not
fault of his.
“Kallang
Roar” is let down no doubt by circumstances resulting
from budget and production difficulties. The bright sparks
of the film where technical, where the editing colorist did
a brilliant job and recreating the look and the feel of the
70s and some of the close up scenes of the pitch action close
up were shot in slo-mo wonderfully, it’s a wonder why
so little of it was used. Instead, we saw lots of slo-mo dribbling
from the likes of Randall Tan and an embarrassing portrayal
of Crazy Horse Nasir Jalil that almost made a mockery of history's
legacy.
It pains me to say that most of the thrill came from the sounds
of the crowd cheering, due to the excellent sound we find
in the cinemas. “Kallang Roar” is not short of
effort and in fact showed great vision in making use of the
great potential the subject matter has as a film. If we could
get an excellent cast, real stars to participate, actual footage
and proper support from all personnel relevant to the story,
then perhaps we can do a “Kallang Roar” movie
that can reach the heights the way Jack Neo's Money No Enough
franchise has shattered all expectations of local film-making.
Until then, watch “Kallang Roar” only to support
the dream of one day seeing our own great football film and
to dream of Singapore being in the World Cup. It is hard,
however, to justify perhaps even a 6 dollar ticket.
Movie Rating:
(Why was this film entirely in English? I only felt
the 1970s through the visual editing colour)
Review by Daniel Lim
Movie Review (B):
Disclaimer:
This reviewer is not a fan of soccer and was briefly interested
in the Malaysia Cup when Singapore won their last cup. He
had heard of the famous soccer players such as Quah Kim Song
but wasn’t aware of their exploits or what they had
done exactly.
Let’s
get the detractions of this film out of the way first. We
had been spoiled by what high end special effects could offer
by the big players from Hollywood and by that standard, what
Kallang Roar could offer was rather amateurish. There were
also moments that I wondered why this film didn’t use
old actual footage for those highlights in the classic matches
that were presented here. The actors performing those goals
scoring and other emotional sporting moments look sluggish
and slow compared to actual matches I had seen. Lastly, there
are blatant moments where I felt that the movie is going straight
for our tears ducts, especially when this film tries to drum
up the protagonist, Uncle Choo’s passion.
But that’s
not what Kallang Roar is about.
Personally,
Kallang Roar is about one man’s love for his country
even when he is faced with discrimination from his own country.
What made it even more heart wrenching is that it’s
based on a real person and events (even if it’s dramatized
to a degree).
Uncle
Choo, a soccer coach that’s appreciated and sought after
in both the Malaysian and Indonesia states but was not allowed
to coach in his own country. He was rejected by petty ego,
lack of paper qualification (a familiar issue even till now)
and the absurd constant worshiping of foreign talents (another
familiar aspect in Singapore isn’t it?).
Now most
people, who would have given up, quit the local scene and
strive for betterment elsewhere but that’s not what
happened. Nothing will deter Uncle Choo’s sense of patriotism
and passion to bring glory to local soccer. He persisted,
grooms a group of soccer players on his own, and waited to
be call up for coaching duties in midst of his own medical
problems.
With a
strong performance by Lim Kay Siu, Uncle Choo’s past
achievements and tribulations hit an arousing home run for
Singapore patriotism. It made me proud to know that someone
had stood against adversity from both external and internal
factors so that we could win something by our very own effort.
An inspiring tribute in believing one self especially in these
times when our authorities favor and promote help from foreign
talents.
Even though
I was sold by the Uncle Choo’s segment in Kallang Roar,
there were other bits that kept me at the edge of my seats.
Ironically it was those slow and sluggish reenactment of those
key moments in the Malaysian cup competition. The actors did
a fine job in portraying their characters that allowed me
to grow with them and even though the soccer competition scenes
were not well choreographed like movies such as GOAL, it has
that realistic excitement to it since it was based an actual
recreation of moments that had transpired.
With the
actors and director at helm, I got to know what was the term
such as “crazy horse” in the past local soccer
context. It was also awe inspiring to learn more about Quah
Kim Song’s goal scoring diving headers through his son
Leon Quah and the existence of the fame one shot banana kick
by the Rajagopal, the best player of the team. They might
not be well known for their acting abilities but in my book,
they did a creditable job in bringing our past heroes back
to life on the big screen. At the end of the climatic finale,
I almost stood up to cheer for the soccer heroes like it was
back in the 1977s and personally, very few films could do
that.
In
a culture that is being progressively program to put foreign
talents high up on the pedestal, it was inspiring to see a
movie that pays tributes to the past achievement of our very
own countrymen. Although Kallang Roar had to suffer with the
budget constrain of an independent film and a few directorial
debut missteps, the heart of the message that Kallang Roar
is trying to tell should be undeniable and commended.
Movie Rating:
(Kallang Roar redefines and reminds us what the Singapore
Pride truly is)
