Review of Dìdi: Bittersweet Asian American Coming-of-Age Drama

It takes a certain maturity to make – and appreciate – a good coming-of-age film. Sean Wang’s debut feature tells the story of Chris Wang (Izaac Wang, no relation to the director), a Taiwanese American boy growing up in the Bay Area, California, in the late 00s. It was the era of AOL Instant Messenger and emo punk posturing. Chris’s mother, Chungsing (Joan Chen), is also a central figure, offering compassionate insight into the struggles of an immigrant parent that a self-involved 13-year-old like Chris couldn’t possibly understand.

The tender teen years have been lovingly chronicled by successive generations of first-time US filmmakers. However, it was relatively rare until recently to see young lives like Chris’s – children of immigrants from places like India, Korea, China, and Iran – reflected on screen with cultural specificity. “Dìdi” strives for a woven-in, naturalistic portrayal. The title itself is the Chinese word for “little brother,” an endearing and slightly infantilizing nickname Chris is eager to shake off. Outside home, Chris introduces himself as Wang Wang, a juvenile nickname he’s unaware he’s ready to outgrow.

Since Chris and his “bridge generation” peers didn’t have films like “Dìdi,” they watched “Superbad,” the 2007 comedy about high school seniors played by Jonah Hill and Michael Cera, who are trying to lose their virginity. Or maybe the 1999 teen comedy “American Pie,” which “Dìdi” gently riffs on without featuring directly. Thankfully, Chris does not emulate the notorious apple pie scene but instead undergoes an awkward and “American” experience involving apple slices and a YouTube kissing tutorial.

In its own way, “Dìdi” joins the ranks of other racially diverse entries in the coming-of-age genre like Pixar’s “Turning Red,” about a 13-year-old Chinese Canadian girl who periodically transforms into a giant menstruation metaphor, and ABC’s Taiwanese-American family sitcom “Fresh Off the Boat” (2015-2020), which focuses on fitting in in suburban Florida.

Visually, with its nostalgic yearning and sun-bleached parking lot palette, “Dìdi” owes a lot to Richard Linklater’s “Boyhood,” albeit more diverse in its racial representation. And much like Bo Burnham’s “Eighth Grade,” it understands that regardless of where your parents were born or where you were raised, if you grew up in the late 00s, you grew up primarily online.

Chen’s understated performance allows us to see all the things that her son isn’t yet able to.

MySpace served as a secret diary for thoughts and favorite lists; Facebook was where crushes were formed and flirting happened; and YouTube was the platform where youthful energies were expended. Chris’s budding interest in filmmaking aligns perfectly with these online avenues. This is Chris’s ploy to befriend a local skate crew: he’ll offer to be their videographer, just as the young Sean Wang did in real life after being inspired by Spike Jonze’s early work.

Sean Wang eventually attended film school at the University of Southern California and made several short films, including the Oscar-nominated documentary “Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó,” before finally breaking through with this Sundance award-winning debut feature at 29. Retrospectively, it’s a self-deprecating in-joke when Chris’s early filmmaking efforts turn out to be an #EpicFail rather than a Spielbergian success akin to “The Fabelmans.” Chris does not transform into a man or an artist overnight, nor over the course of one cinematic summer.

But it doesn’t really matter, because while Chris is preoccupied with impressing his peers, the film uses a wider lens to view his life, focusing on his relationship with his mother. Chen’s understated performance allows us to see everything Chris isn’t yet able to: her sacrifices, her patience with her mother-in-law’s endless griping, and above all, her constant love for her son. Chris’s dismissive attitude towards his mother is far more damaging to his “cool” image than any out-of-focus skateboarding tricks. The parting words from a wise skatepark buddy could have served as the film’s bittersweet tagline: “Dude, don’t talk to your mom like that.”

Source: The Guardian