The Motel gives the lie to all those mainstream teen sex comedies starring happy, horny gwailos .

| Original Score: 3/4 | Nov 17, 2006

Perhaps The Motel meanders a bit too much -- hard to do in a 76-minute film -- but it is an engaging little movie.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 20, 2006

It's a modest triumph of unflattering realism, proving yet again that a camera, a few good actors, the right material and a sensitive director are all you need to illuminate any particular aspect of humanity.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Sep 1, 2006

There is honesty and integrity in the filmmaking and the performances, which make The Motel among the best character studies of the year.

Full Review | Original Score: B+ | Aug 31, 2006

A well-worn coming-of-age tale enlivened by pungent detail and a sharp visual sense.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jul 27, 2006

Even if writer-director Michael Kang doesn't exactly break new ground, he imbues his debut with a quiet, compelling inertia that mimics puberty's rudderless drift, its burgeoning desire for something, anything, to change.

Full Review | Jul 27, 2006

The film about of a teenage Chinese-American boy struggling with adolescent issues while working in his family's fleabag motel has the precise brevity of a well-crafted short story.

Full Review | Jul 6, 2006

Unlike so many indie films, Michael Kang's gently empathetic debut embraces eccentricity without drowning in its own hip irony.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 30, 2006

Like the best independent films, The Motel realizes that life is made up of minor pleasures and tiny epiphanies, not sweeping character arcs or big dramatic moments

| Original Score: B+ | Jun 29, 2006

Michael Kang Kang makes an impressive feature directorial debut with The Motel. But the person to keep an eye on is Jeffrey Chyau, a student at the Bronx High School of Science, who is a delight in the lead role.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 28, 2006

There's little originality in the joy rides, first kisses, and clashes with bullies, yet this 2005 debut feature by writer-director Michael Kang captures the small triumphs of a boy becoming a man.

| Jun 27, 2006

Michael Kang's small, perfectly observed portrait of a Chinese-American boy captures the glum desperation of inhabiting the biological limbo of early adolescence.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Jun 27, 2006

The Motel, Michael Kang's modest Sundance applause reaper, doesn't deserve to be shotgunned for the sins of 30 other movies. But the underwhelming syncopation of make-nice clichs is too familiar.

Full Review | Jun 27, 2006

Like Jared Hess before him, director Michael Kang is the new kid on the block who wants to play inside Wes Anderson's clubhouse.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 16, 2006

Funny and real.

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 6, 2006

Indie coming-of-age dramedy about a precocious Chinese-American youth whose family operates a sleazy roadside motel signals arrival of a singularly promising filmmaker.

Full Review | May 6, 2006