Breaking news: I need to take a few unscheduled days to spend with family, so I’m signing off early this week.
Thanks for understanding! I appreciate all of you so much.
To keep you in the diversity frame of mind, I’ll leave you with three film recommendations for the long weekend, perfect if you need to take a break from the cook-outs and gatherings. The theme, very much on my mind, is family:
Pushing Hands is Ang Lee’s first feature film. Made in 1992, it tells the story of a retired Tai Chi grandmaster who relocates from Beijing to the U.S. to live with his only son in a non-descript New York suburb. His daughter-in-law, a white, American, struggling novelist, is unmoored by his presence. The quiet film deals with familiar tensions of filial obligation, tradition, and culture shock; the title, a tai chi reference, describes a bigger conflict. “Pushing hands” is explained as “a way of keeping your balance while unbalancing your opponent.” But when the opponent is the modern world, pushing hands also means navigating shifting identities. Fans of The Wedding Banquet and Eat Drink Man Woman, will recognize the sensibility of an emerging master. Fans of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon will enjoy some brief moments of martial arts magic. My guess is that Chinese and Chinese American viewers may enjoy some specific and tender moments, such as the wonderful one when the elder Mr. Chu, played by the elegant Sihung Lung, kindles a fine romance in a Chinatown community center amid a dumpling-making throng.
Cheesy trailer here, on Amazon.
Creedmoria is writer/director Lee Slimmer’s debut film, and it borrows heavily from her life growing up in Queens, New York in the 1980s. The family dysfunction starts from the jump. Seventeen year old Candy, played by Stef Dawson from The Hunger Games series, is managing to come of age despite a boozy, self-absorbed mother, an addicted and delicate older brother, a fabulous but closeted younger brother and the desperate longing for her dead father. There are a host of other elements in this high school drama – including a creepy leather-jacket-wearing boyfriend and a fast-food slinging boss known only as “Dickhead Manager.” There are even a few zombies, sort of. But what there is in abundance is a profound sense of what it means to love your complicated tribe despite needing to escape them. Though the dysfunction is real, I laughed through tears. It won a bunch of awards on the festival circuit and deserved to, including a number of “Audience Favorite” nods, “Best Comedy,” “Best Director,” and “Best Ensemble Cast.” Stinkin’ best film ever, I say. (Disclaimer: Lee is a friend and the spouse of a Fortune colleague. But still.)
Trailer here, on iTunes,Google Play, and Amazon
The Lost Arcade is a really good documentary about the way people love games. I loved it. (I wrote about this documentary last year, and I’m going to keep writing about it until one of y’all watches it and tells me they loved it too.) On the surface of things The Lost Arcade is the story of a sketchy looking arcade in Chinatown that drew a wildly diverse group of people who loved playing digital games. But it ended up being so much more. For one, it has the best opening scene of any documentary I’ve seen in ages. But it’s also about misfits and cast-outs, of people with imagination but no homes, business visionaries disguised as maintenance people, and how communities are transformed in the strangest ways by the people you least expect. It’s also about how the shallow victories of gentrification and technology innovation don’t really matter if you’ve got friends who will battle you and quarters in your pocket, especially if you’ve got next. It’s the way families are chosen, not made. It’s available on Amazon, iTunes, all over the place. Edited, produced and directed by Kurt Vincent, written and produced by Irene Chin.
Pushing Hands is Ang Lee’s first feature film. Made in 1992, it tells the story of a retired Tai Chi grandmaster who relocates from Beijing to the U.S. to live with his only son in a non-descript New York suburb. His daughter-in-law, a white, American, struggling novelist, is unmoored by his presence. The quiet film deals with familiar tensions of filial obligation, tradition, and culture shock; the title, a tai chi reference, describes a bigger conflict. “Pushing hands” is explained as “a way of keeping your balance while unbalancing your opponent.” But when the opponent is the modern world, pushing hands also means navigating shifting identities. Fans of The Wedding Banquet and Eat Drink Man Woman, will recognize the sensibility of an emerging master. Fans of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon will enjoy some brief moments of martial arts magic. My guess is that Chinese and Chinese American viewers may enjoy some specific and tender moments, such as the wonderful one when the elder Mr. Chu, played by the elegant Sihung Lung, kindles a fine romance in a Chinatown community center amid a dumpling-making throng.
Cheesy trailer here, on Amazon.
Creedmoria is writer/director Lee Slimmer’s debut film, and it borrows heavily from her life growing up in Queens, New York in the 1980s. The family dysfunction starts from the jump. Seventeen year old Candy, played by Stef Dawson from The Hunger Games series, is managing to come of age despite a boozy, self-absorbed mother, an addicted and delicate older brother, a fabulous but closeted younger brother and the desperate longing for her dead father. There are a host of other elements in this high school drama – including a creepy leather-jacket-wearing boyfriend and a fast-food slinging boss known only as “Dickhead Manager.” There are even a few zombies, sort of. But what there is in abundance is a profound sense of what it means to love your complicated tribe despite needing to escape them. Though the dysfunction is real, I laughed through tears. It won a bunch of awards on the festival circuit and deserved to, including a number of “Audience Favorite” nods, “Best Comedy,” “Best Director,” and “Best Ensemble Cast.” Stinkin’ best film ever, I say. (Disclaimer: Lee is a friend and the spouse of a Fortune colleague. But still.)
Trailer here, on iTunes,Google Play, and Amazon
The Lost Arcade is a really good documentary about the way people love games. I loved it. (I wrote about this documentary last year, and I’m going to keep writing about it until one of y’all watches it and tells me they loved it too.) On the surface of things The Lost Arcade is the story of a sketchy looking arcade in Chinatown that drew a wildly diverse group of people who loved playing digital games. But it ended up being so much more. For one, it has the best opening scene of any documentary I’ve seen in ages. But it’s also about misfits and cast-outs, of people with imagination but no homes, business visionaries disguised as maintenance people, and how communities are transformed in the strangest ways by the people you least expect. It’s also about how the shallow victories of gentrification and technology innovation don’t really matter if you’ve got friends who will battle you and quarters in your pocket, especially if you’ve got next. It’s the way families are chosen, not made. It’s available on Amazon, iTunes, all over the place. Edited, produced and directed by Kurt Vincent, written and produced by Irene Chin.
See you on the flipside. Here’s one breaking news haiku to tide you over:
Dance like no one is
watching! But live like Ronan
Farrow always is
RaceAhead will return on Wednesday, September 5. I wish you a stress-free and spectacular end of summer.