saving face (2004)
So, I have been watching these movies with some internet pals on a monthly basis, and for the month of May I decided to aim for some movies that weren't downers (mainly because I am hosting this for others and feel that it is a host's duty to not just inflict wall after wall of bleak films on people even if I would personally be fine with that). To that end I selected Alice Wu's 2004 romantic comedy, Saving Face, which is available on The Criterion Channel. There are probably some fairly broad spoilers below.
My selection process for these movies is based entirely on vibes, and this one was actually a bit of a last minute selection as the movie I had originally intended to watch left the Criterion Channel at the start of the month. I chose it because it appeared in a collection of films starring Joan Chen, and because queer films are important, and because, as Criterion describes it, "a slyly perceptive, culturally specific look at Chinese American family values and what it means to both honor and break with tradition" sounds fascinating.
And I enjoyed it! It's a lesbian love story, it's a story about being too afraid of the weight of cultural condemnation to live your authentic self, it's a story about finding the courage to do that anyway. And it's a story about family: Joan Chen's character, the 40-something widowed mother of our main character, has come unexpectedly pregnant and been kicked out of her family home to move in with her daughter. This added tension puts a twist1 on the otherwise fairly traditional rom-com formula, largely by adding layers to it. That our main character's love story is happening while she is somewhat unwillingly sharing her home with her very depressed mother adds so much character to what is going on.
I learned after this movie happened that the studios were pushing to make all of the characters white, or, when Alice Wu refused to do that, to at least make the love interest white (played by Scarlett Johansson, apparently). Fortunately, she refused to budge, and the resulting film is so much richer for it.
I didn't have a lot to say about this one, but that's not really a reflection on the film--more upbeat films in general tend to be harder to write about, and I'm not as familiar with the genre so there's less room for me to comment on the ways it interfaces with its genre conventions. I definitely intend to check out Alice Wu's other films down the line (of which, tragically, there are only two). Great time overall; my sense is that this one is broadly regarded as part of the queer cinema canon and I can absolutely see why.
I kind of hate that word.↩