It’s about time.
That is the feeling behind “Crazy Rich Asians,” the first major studio production in 25 years to feature all-Asian talent on both sides of the camera. Premiering on Wednesday, the film is being touted as the opening into Hollywood that Asians feel is both needed and deserved.
“It’s overdue,” said Chris Lee, founder of the University of Hawaii’s Academy for Creative Media and a longtime film industry executive. “I think it’s going to do well. I hope it’s going to do well.”
“Crazy Rich Asians,” a family-oriented rom-com, tells the story of Rachel Chu (Constance Wu of “Fresh Off the Boat”), an economics professor in New York, who ventures to Singapore with her boyfriend Nick Young (newcomer Henry Golding), whose family, unbeknownst to her, is fabulously wealthy. Based on the best-selling novel by Kevin Kwan, the film features cast members, all with Asian ancestry, from the U.S., Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines. Director Jon Chu is a Chinese-American from California.
“The themes are universal,” Lee said. “This is a romantic comedy, this is about meeting your in-laws. Everybody can relate to that. And then the fact that you’re surrounded by wealth? Think of how many screwball comedies, how many ‘Dynasties’ are set against that kind of milieu, because people enjoy watching rich people.”
That certainly resonated with people like Robert Hsu, a financial advisor who is originally from Taiwan. “I think it’s great to see what all these crazy rich people do,” he said at an early screening of the film. “I think it’s cool to see the life that these people lead rather than the average, middle-income people. But at the end of the day, it’s just a movie, and that’s what we can get out of it.”
FOR ASIANS, the film represents a validation of identity as well as good entertainment.
“There isn’t that frequency of seeing a big studio film with characters who looked like me,” said Anderson Le, artistic director of the Hawaii International Film Festival.
Le, a film programmer now based in California, saw an early preview of the film in July. He was especially pleased to see that it veered away from common portrayals of Asians in film.
“To be frank, the mainstream view of Asians tends to be myopic – martial arts, kung fu, or what have you,” he said. “This is not that kind of genre film. It’s really about family drama, family comedy. What I liked about the film is that it doesn’t dilute the Asian values that the characters are faced with.”
“Crazy Rich Asians” is the first major studio film to feature Asians in all the major roles since Disney’s “The Joy Luck Club” was released in 1993. That film, which went on to modest success after being marketed as a “word of mouth” film, faced its own barriers to production. Lee, then a producer with TriStar Pictures and Columbia Pictures, remembers pitching “Joy Luck” to fellow executives only to get the response that “There were no ‘Americans’ in it.
“I said ‘They ARE Americans, they just don’t look like you,’” he said.
“Crazy Rich Asians” got a similar treatment from one prospective producer who, according to the New York Times, wanted to have the role of Rachel transformed into a Caucasian, though the filmmakers held firm.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, filmmakers are hoping for a box office of $20 million in its first week; that would approximately match the opening take of last year’s filmed-in-Hawaii comedy “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle.”
IN HONOLULU, audiences are already reacting to the film with excitement and admiration. The film screened Tuesday at a preview at Ward Villages arranged by HIFF.
“I like the whole crazy Asian thing,” said Galen Kawasaki, from Kaneohe, who came to the screening with his wife Laurie.
Kawasaki said that while he is Asian, he is neither crazy nor rich. “I like to dream about this kind of thing. … Usually you see a film like this, they have a lot of blacks and whites, but not Asians.”
“I think it’s wonderful that the range of films that depict Asian-American experiences has increased with this film,” said Konrad Ng, executive director of the Shangri La Museum of Islamic Art, Culture & Design. “It has studio backing, it has a platform in which it can reach a broad audience. The public is well-served by having a diverse set of stories told on the widest platform available, particularly in a movie theater. …
“It is a communal experience,” Ng said. “You’re in a room full of a number of other people, so you’re in here with maybe a hundred other opinions.”
After the screening, State Sen. Stanley Chang, who was instrumental in bringing the film here a week before its general release, was ecstatic.
“It was amazing, better than the book,” he said. “They showed so much about the characters’ emotions, high, lows, and they did it in such a well-crafted way.”
He urged local audiences to see the film “with their family members, many times, so that our stories will be told.
“We need this film to succeed. It’s been 25 years since the last Asian Hollywood movie, and if this one does not succeed it will be another 25 years. ”
