the year of the yao...

This past weekend I got to experience the magic that is Yao. Yes my friends, as part of the NAATA Asian American Film Festival (which concludes this weekend in San Jose), I saw the documentary, The Year of the Yao.

For those of you who may not know who Yao Ming is, he's the All-Star center for the Houston Rockets, first pick of the 2002 NBA Draft, and a native of Shanghai, China. Yao is the first foreign born player drafted #1, and this documentary shows the trials and tribulations of his transition to the U.S. and the NBA.

As an aside, I've always been fascinated with Yao's story. Heck, a friend and I even put together the Yao Minute website to pay homage to our hoops playing pal. I remember reading about Yao when he first declared for the draft. NBA scouts compared his "upside" as being the next Rik Smits. All I could think was, Rik Smits? Really? That's worth a #1 pick? Who's going #2? The next Joe Barry Carroll? Luckily Yao has exceeded these early expectations -- although for a 7'5" dude, he still only rebounds about as well as Emmanuel Lewis at a pickup game at the YMCA.

The film itself lightly touches upon the major plot points of Yao's journey while never quite delving into what makes Yao tick. We see that his early days in the NBA were difficult, mostly due to his inability to speak the language. However, all of the sudden Yao shines in the later part of his rookie year with the Rockets. How did he make the leap? Did his English improve so he could understand the coaches? Was it merely being a bigger part of the Rockets offense that got him working harder? Did his teammates get more comfortable with him and just pass it to him more? We never really know. He just got better, and now he's one of the game's greats. End of story.

Similarly, we hear about the weight that representing China as a hoops playing ambassador had on Yao's life. However, we don't get a window into how this affects Yao. Is it a burden? Is he a proud ambassador? Is he merely playing the role of the good soldier? Again, we never really know. It's a passing side plot and completely disposable -- kind of like cousin Oliver on the Brady Bunch.

Instead of the story behind the story, we're just spoon-fed your basic coming to America success story puntuated by SportsCenter highlights of Yao's best and worst moments. The fact that NBA Entertainment played a large role in the making of this documentary probably has a lot to do with this. For them, all they see is a vehicle for pushing the game both here and internationally. Yao's backstory doesn't sell the NBA. Yao dunking over Shaq does. So that's what we see, which is fine if I'm watching NBA Inside Stuff at home on my couch, but I didn't feel as if I learned anything new about Yao after watching this documetary.

Despite my criticisms, I walked out of the movie theater entertained. The packaging of the movie was well done, and the clips were well put together to tell the story through the basketball highlights. However, as a doumentary, it had about as much substance as the "Donna Martin Graduates" episode of 90210. Still, on the Salinger Scale (where a party of five is the highest rating) I'm holding a reservation for Julia, Bailey, and Claudia. 3 Salingers for The Year of the Yao.