DONUT LET YOUR EYES GLAZE OVER
Fast-food doc a sweet tale of perseverance and success with some cruller-like twists
I can't remember the last time I so enjoyed a documentary that had such a massive hole in the centre.
At face value, The Donut King is a heartwarming, rags-toriches, immigrant-makes-good tale. But director Alice Gu uses some creative editing choices to reveal a shocking twist to the life story of a fast-food entrepreneur, before stickhandling a sweet ending to her documentary.
At the heart of the story is Ted Ngoy, born Bun Tek Ngoy in 1941 Cambodia.
He and his family fled the fighting in that country in 1975 and ended up in Tustin, Calif., an hour's drive south of Los Angeles. There he discovered a delicious food that reminded him of Cambodian Nom Kong. (Every country has its doughnut.)
After a brief apprenticeship at Winchell's, a western doughnut-shop staple, Ngoy struck out on his own and quickly made good.
His creative cost-cutting techniques included using cheaper pink stock for his takeout containers, which is why if you Google “donut box” (or “doughnut box”) today you'll see pink at the top.
The speed with which he gained a stronghold in the California market is astonishing. By 1979 he owned some 25 doughnut shops. By 1985 he was netting US$100,000 a month from his business. And he'd started sponsoring fellow Cambodian refugees, setting them up in the trade.
Even today, if you walk into an independent Southern California doughnut bakery, you're likely to find it run by first or second-generation Cambodian-americans. One grateful owner notes that when she opened her shop, she knew only about 20 words of English. Ten of them were doughnut names.
Gu had an ulterior motive in making her movie, which she describes as a Trojan Horse. Beneath the glaze is a powerful message about the positive role played by immigrants in America.
We twice see a speech from then-president Gerald Ford on the topic, a view not shared by the grandson of German immigrants currently occupying the White House.
There's even more to discover, but I won't reveal the cruller-like twists in the plot. There's nothing worse than a spoiled doughnut doc.
Oh, and if you're interested in a fictional tale of immigrants and doughnuts, the recent release First Cow is a wonderful story of ingenuity and oily cakes, set in 19th-century Oregon.