Wee Li Lin was a prolific director of short films which won so many awards both in Singapore and abroad that eventually, she made the jump into feature films in 2005. Forever is her sophomore effort and it shows the mark of a director continuing to work out the intricacies of the feature film format.

The premise of Forever is actually very solid and inventive. You can think of it as The Cable Guy done as a dark romantic comedy. Joanna Dong plays a filmmaker who makes films about love (for a state-run dating agency, no less!) but mistakes her films about love to be the same thing as real love. She also mistakes the male lead she casts and acts alongside in her films as the true love of her life and as a stalker full of good intentions, gives Jim Carrey a run for his money. Hilarity and much twisted humour ensues.

It is not often at all a film teaches us the map is not the territory, that the representation is not the thing, that what passes for love and courtship in film (be it propaganda from Hollywood or an ad agency producing for a ministry) is far away from how sane people behave in the real world.

As I said, the premise is solid. In terms of execution, I thought Wee Li Lin didn’t dare to go where the premise should have led her. Like most Singaporean writer-directors, Wee seems unable or unwilling to trust her story. Like most Singaporean films, Forever feels at times like a sketch comedy show that sticks at making a couple of easy, obvious jokes and jibes. We understand that the director made this when she went back to film school to learn more about scriptwriting. We would love to see her next film when she graduates.