Shanghai Kiss (2007)

Director: Kern Konwiser, David Ren
Writer: David Ren
Cast: Ken Leung, Hayden Panettiere, Kelly Hu, Joel Moore
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance

Shanghai Kiss starts out charming and quite funny. Hayden nails the high school girl role and Ken Leung's character isn't yet annoying enough to lose my interest. Later on Ren and Konwiser lose the grip a little, but any Hayden fan will at least get enough out of this on her smaller role.

Lium (Leung) is a 28 year old lost Asian-American looking for acting work in L.A. after dropping out of school. He avoids all stereotypes, looking to be threatened like the American he feels like. The only girl he can bare to stay close to sober for more than a couple of hours, is a 16 year old high school girl (Panettiere).

His life takes a turn as his grandmother dies in Shanghai, leaving her house to him in her will. Going back to his roots to sell the house, he soon finds another look at life. It's never getting profound or exciting, but there are some really good scenes in this one. Most of them quite early in the movie, but at least you'll have some good memories in those later parts that might annoy quite a few out there.