In 2024 there was a Chinese Movie made in the Netherlands called Happy Palace, its premise is almost the same as Fagara, which is a Hong Kong movie that came out a few years prior in 2019. The main plot of both are: Due to the sudden death of the father, the children come back and take over the restaurant, so they could pay off their father’s debt. Let’s see which film did it better. Warning, spoilers ahead!
Protagonist
The main protagonist in both films is a daughter who works at a call center. In Happy Palace it’s Yung Ling played by Donna Tang and Fagara we have Acacia played by Sammi Cheng. I can relate more with Acacia, especially struggles or working hard and has noticeable change through the film. At the start she numbs herself from her emotions, like Mala Hotpot which is a numbing hotpot, but at the end she openly expresses it.
While Yung Ling doesn’t have a character development as her character is a bit all over the place to really see any change. Yung Ling inner struggles are also not visualized enough to truly acknowledge them, but also the same can be said for its resolve. As when she said she missed her father, it is said in such an emotionless way, it doesn’t feel like she meant it.
The Call
Let’s compare the scene where they get the call about their father. Yung Ling gets to work and her colleagues are celebrating her birthday on the wrong day and get a call from her mom Suk Wai. Who asks why people are celebrating her birthday and tells her to come to the restaurant to help out as her father has died.
Acacia is working at her desk, but gets spam calls, however the last call tells her something happened to her dad, which sounds like a scam call and she brushes it off as one, till the other end tells her to rush to a hospital, she then knew it wasn’t a scam.
Fagara did it better as the whole scene is more relatable, people all over the world know about the spam and scam phone calls. But also the call about her father is more straight to the point realistic. We see her trying to grab a taxi cab to go to the hospital and she was too late and he already died.
While Happy Palace the mom Suk Wai tells Yung Ling about the death at the end of the conversation, like her husband death is not a big deal and coming back to help out at the restaurant is more important.
Happy Palace also neglected Chinese culture of seeing family members one last time before dying, which is a big important moment, which Fagara did do a good job with. It would make much more sense if Suk Wai directly just said: “Something happened to your father”. Then cut to the burial, so we could presume more things had happened, instead of already saying he had passed away.
Birthday
In Fagara Acacia is asked to check the details of her father and a nurse asks her his the date of birth, however she only knows his birthday is on but not the year. Which honestly, is something common and relatable but also foreshadowing of her not knowing a lot of her father’s past.
While Happy Palace is like a forced mistake as they are working in a modern company and the boss and colleagues should easily check the database for her actual birthday. So it doesn’t make any sense nor is it a relatable problem. It also doesn’t have a deeper meaning to it, other than the people working at that office are stupid. Point goes to Fagara for being realistic and relatable.
Funeral
After both fathers had died we of course got a funeral, but somehow Happy Palace chose to do a Burial scene instead of a funeral. But it is an odd mix of Chinese and western burial ritual, with speeches are given by friends and also things are burnt. Yung Ling is wearing black and gives a whole speech in front of the grave and then her brother Lok Man stumbles late to the funeral and hugs his mother Suk Wai and cries.
In Faraga we get an actual Cantonese Taoist Funeral which is held in a Funeral Parlour, we see Acacia also dressed accordingly in the white funeral clothing. We see her first estranged step-sister Branch who does the bowing ritual. After we see a Taoist ritual of breaking hell’s gate, where the 2nd estranged step-sister Cherry arrives fashionably late. After the ritual The doctor played by Richie Ren comes and we get a funny Joke, where he tells Acacia her father is a buddhist, while the whole staff of the restaurant knew he was a Buddist and just didn’t say anything. Then two step sisters ask Acacia to see their father one last time and all 3 start to cry in front of the father and bond.
Another point for Fagara, who understands the culture, while Happy Palace didn’t even spend 10 seconds to google Chinese burial rituals. As Chinese Burials should be only for close family wearing all white without any jewelry and also family should not say anything during the whole ceremony preventing calling back the spirit of the dead.
Huge problem at Happy Palace is that the mother Suk Wai should know the proper rituals as she moved from China to the Netherlands, as in the scene after she talks about how they need to respect the 3 months of mourning. If the story didn’t included Suk Wai, it would make sense for the 2nd generation of Chinese to mess up all the rituals without knowing better. Or just make it a Christian family and have a normal western burial.
Restaurants
Then to the restaurants, Happy palace is quite a medium size Chinese Indonesian restaurant and somehow ran by just the mom, dad and Yung Ling before and after the fathers death the Yung Ling and Suk Wai did the cooking while Lok Man waitered.
While at Fagara, a small hotpot restaurant in Tai Hang area of Causeway bay in Hong Kong. It is run by 4 staff members, one old lady does the dishes, one guy does the kitchen and two people waitering. But with two additional sisters added became 4 people waitering.
Points goes to Fagara as there is a much more realistic amount of staff running around, Happy Palace just understaffed for the size of restaurant it is, they would need 3 people in the kitchen and 2 people waitering. Especially when the restaurant was running well, it would be more realistic if they added more staff.
Money Troubles
Both films have money problems they need to solve. With Happy Palace the father has accumulated a debt of 75.000euro from Aunt Ming, who also happens to be triad. The debt is also the fault of the father for sponsoring 1000 euro monthly for over a decade so Lok Man could chase his dreams of becoming an artist.
While Fagara the hotpot restaurant still has a lease on renting the location and paying off the lease would leave them in a big debt. They had an option of selling the place with the name of the restaurant which could have been a simple option to avoid needing to pay the lease. However they decided to keep the restaurant open till the end of the lease, so the staff would have work.
Points goes to Fagara as it’s just all realistic conflict that can happen in such a situation. While Happy Palace I can’t relate to it, especially the inclusion of Chinese Maffia. As they were more a thing in the 80s or 90s, but in the last few decades they pretty much disappeared in the Netherlands. I feel it’s also a negative racial stereotype to be included in a Dutch movie. Also the restaurant would be easily sold for 200.000 euro and paid off the debt instantly.
Food
Of Course points goes to Fagara which includes food elements very well, the doctor even talks about how spice is a feeling of pain to cover another pain. When Cherry had a toothache they gave her Fagara spice to help cover the pain. After they used up all the hotpot soup base, they had to rediscover the father’s recipe and find that one secret ingredient that gives it the distinct flavor. But also for Acacia to learn about her fathers past.
There is food in Happy Palace because it is a restaurant, but there isn’t any special meaning behind them. At home Yung Ling makes a really dry looking Zha Jiang Mian, which somehow makes her realize she wants to cook. Next scene she talks about revamping the menu, but the new dishes are basically standard Chinese dishes you find in any Chinese Indonesian restaurants. Honestly they aren’t even the most appetizing looking dishes especially the fish and the white chicken. There are way more new hyped dishes from China and Hong Kong, especially food that people like to share on instagram which entails free marketing.
The Father
Happy Palace there is nothing I could relate to from the father and also there also nothing likable about him, but also we don’t see enough of him to really care either. Especially after the nightmare shot of him force feeding Yung Ling. And he basically tried to poison Aunt Ming to get rid of his debt instead of finding other solutions.
In Fagara we get a really nice and caring father, while the only bad thing he did was having kids with multiple ladies. But during the film we discover with Acacia that he was a very caring person, who cared about his staff and also cared about all his daughters even though they are far away. We see him working hard but still doing the little things to connect with his daughter, like watching Branch snooker tournaments on tv and chatting with Cherry. The only daughter he didn’t have a good connection with was Acacia who disliked him and ignored him for the wrong reasons. There are a lot more emotional moments in Fagara and even simply him saying Sorry he couldn’t be there for Acacia on a recorder already gets the audience tearing up.
Festive ending
Somehow both films end at a festivity, Happy Palace at Chinese New year and Fagara at mid autumn festival. During the Fire dragon dance Acacia gets reminded of a regretful moment in her past, where she ignored her father at the mid autumn festival, instead of spending it with him. And started shouting that she forgave him and really misses him and unites crying with her sisters. Which is such a teary eye moment of the movie.
Happy Palace has a Chinese new year scene where they celebrate it with customers, but most Chinese restaurants don’t open till midnight; most closes at 9 or 10pm. However after fireworks the mother sees the ghost of her husband showing up and waves goodbye, then Suk Wai saying he can finally go away peacefully. This is some weird mystical orientalism as the father was not a restless ghost in the rest of the movie. Also such a cop out ending as the mother just torch down the restaurant and does an insurance fraud to claim 70.000 euro, which honestly isn’t that much.
Message of the movies
Fagara is about being together, well said in the last scene with Any Lau it’s not about wanting or being able to be together, as you are missing the bigger picture which is together. As Acacia missed out on the moments she could have been together with her dad eating or celebrating new year. It is about cherishing the moment you are together with your family or loved ones.
Happy Palace isn’t about working hard to accomplish something, it’s about if you can’t pay back your debt, it’s OK to just murder the person who lended you the money and burn your house down to claim insurance money.
Conclusion
The better movie is Fagara, as it not only understands Chinese culture, but did proper research on all the subjects, given a lot of deeper meanings to them and the comedic and sad moments are just much stronger.
Happy Palace fails as a dark comedy as it’s hard to find any dark comedy in this film, even the jokes at Fagara are more noticeable. But because they filmed it as a dark comedy, it also does not take itself seriously enough, it causes the film to have an identity crisis. Because of the lack of understanding of Chinese culture and even lack of proper research about the topics, the film is just soulless in its writing.
