Be(ar) With Me

We take our sense of touch for granted too often, until we learn that for the blind, and the blind-and-deaf, touch is the only receptor of sense they have. To touch is to feel the crevices of another’s hand or face; it is to guide another’s hand toward something or to make that very hand feel something else. Touch conveys so much more meaning, intimacy and humanity than sight or speech.

Of course, smell and taste still exist for someone who is blind-and-deaf. But touch is the gateway to another human being’s soul, spirit and secrets.

Touch, however, can also be the arouser of passion, the murderer of dignity and the destructor of the floodgates of desire. Touch can inflame, touch can kill.

When you watch Eric Khoo’s Be With Me, there is a realization that touch can be the soulfood for the mind, but also the lustfood for the soul.

Khoo also explores facets of teen love, unrequited togetherness, loneliness, abuse and disability in both the heartland and the rich-land in the near-2-hour film. The movie just confirms what a lot of us know from long ago: the most powerful dramas don’t come from movies, but from our own lives.

Be With Me is not a commercial flick that would typically see ticket sales like that of Jack Neo’s films. You need a lot of patience to watch this one, especially with the minimal dialogue and extended shot durations, which makes the experience of watching it waaaay longer than it really is. Watch it if you have time and money to spare. If not, catch it on original VCD.