Blu-ray Review: Sean Baker and Shih-Ching Tsou’s Take Out on the Criterion Collection

In the opening shot of Sean Baker and Shih-Ching Tsou’s Take Out, two debt collectors (played by Tsou and Joe Chien) pound relentlessly on an apartment door. Upon forcing their way in, they weave through every nook and cranny of a cramped New York City apartment, which houses some eight or nine people, until they find their target: an undocumented Chinese immigrant and restaurant deliveryman, Ming Ding (Charles Jang), who owes their boss thousands of dollars and has missed his last two payments. It’s a lengthy, anxiety-inducing sequence with a bracing energy that recalls the work of the Dardennes and the early films of the Safdie brothers.

With his ever-roving camera, Baker (who also served as the film’s DP) captures the chaos and terror of the situation but also pauses occasionally for a few seconds to take in the minute details of the surroundings, such as a quiet close-up that follows a cockroach as it walks along the edge of a frying pan. The scene’s calculated juxtaposition of one man’s despair within an environment that’s indifferent, oblivious, or malicious to his suffering—or, as in this case, all three at once—becomes the film’s modus operandi as Ming sets out to get the additional $800 he needs to ensure the loan shark he’s indebted to doesn’t double what he owes.

The rest of Take Out is less concerned with the specifics of Ming’s debt than the journey that his run-in with the debt collectors serves as the impetus for. All the while, the filmmakers are as curious about the hard-scrabble, working-class neighborhood that Ming delivers food in as they are about his personal struggles. As Ming goes about a busy night of deliveries in harsh weather, the film’s jagged, elliptical editing creates the feeling that he’s stuck in a seemingly endless cycle of rushing between the small Chinese restaurant that he works for and his many destinations. It’s a clever approach that introduces the audience to the other immigrants he works with as well as to the colorful melting pot of customers he comes into contact with.

Economic anxiety is rarely spoken about in the film, but the life-and-death importance of dollars and cents is felt in every frame. At the restaurant, the establishment’s owner, Big Sis (played by the actual owner of the joint, Wang-Thye Lee) banters with several customers who are trying get a discount on their food and deals with another pestering customer who won’t take no for an answer after asking her to exchange his spare change for a five-dollar bill.

For Ming, the difference between getting stiffed and getting a two- or three-dollar tip feels monumental. Meanwhile, customers’ complaints about wrong orders or poking fun at his inability to speak English sting that much harder once we see how much toil goes into delivering even the smallest of orders. Much of Take Out consists of rough, handheld tracking shots of Ming as he bikes around, weaving through the hustle and bustle of the city, fighting against the aggressive traffic, hard rain, and the ticking clock that marks the end of his shift.

It’s a remarkably simple setup, yet Baker and Tsou enliven it through their persistent pursuit of authenticity. Real workers are filmed cooking in the restaurant and the customers on screen are a combination of actual customers and local non-actors, allows the film to take on the aura of documentary verisimilitude. Although there was a finished script, Take Out still has a distinctly improvisational feel that, along with its run-and-gun shooting style, lends the film an enthralling unpredictability that mirrors the trepidation and sense of unease that many undocumented workers live with on a daily basis.

Image/Sound

There’s only so much a restoration can do to improve footage shot on DVCAM, but as with its recent transfer of The Celebration, Criterion has unearthed as much detail as possible from Take Out without smoothing out the rough edges of its low-res source. Scenes inside the restaurant are bathed in a sickly green hue that very much suits the grueling environment, while the nighttime sequences, many of which were shot in the rain, are richly textured. There’s also little to no motion blur, which is particularly impressive in a film where the camera darts around so quickly and long zooms are frequently employed. The mix on the disc’s stereo soundtrack nicely balances the near-constant background chatter and city street ambience.

Extras

In a 2009 commentary track, Sean Baker and Shih-Ching Tsou and actor Charles Jang discuss the challenges of making a film on a shoestring budget, from shooting before certain actors had to be at work to employing a skeleton crew because of the extremely tight spaces where much of the interiors were shot. It’s a lively discussion that confirms that Take Out was a labor of love for everyone involved. In a making-of extra shot soon after the film was made, the directors talk about their pre-production process, while a new featurette, with interviews with Baker, Tsou, Jang, and actors Wang-Thye Lee and Jeng-Hua Yu, focuses more on the production, including shooting with actual restaurant workers and customers and the restrictions imposed by Baker not speaking Mandarin. The package is rounded out by some deleted scenes, Jang’s screen test, and a booklet with an essay by filmmaker and author J.J. Murphy.

Overall

Criterion’s release of Take Out shows that the work of America’s premier purveyor of life on the fringes was both unflinching and empathetic from the start.