‘Dìdi (弟弟)’ Review: Sean Wang Digs Into 2000s Nostalgia for Deeply Felt First Feature | SXSW 2024
Growing up, your social circle often feels indicative of your status and rank. Most coming-of-age films have a “painful accuracy” on this front, but Taiwanese-American and recent Oscar nominated filmmaker Sean Wang manages to push a deeper button within me with his feature debut Dìdi. The protagonist Chris Wang (Izaac Wang, Good Boys, Raya and the Last Dragon) and I both grew up as Bay Area Taiwanese-Americans who tried to find friends in the 2000s, down to the same year we entered high school in the fall of 2008.
Chris is a guy who tries very hard to look cool. Most of all, he second guesses on what’s considered the right thing to do. I must be cool because I’m hanging out with that cool guy who talks to girls, right? Right?? Chris thinks about this on a daily basis, but time and time again, his insecurities get to him. One can’t blame him though. In his friend group, he is nicknamed “Wang Wang.” Yes, of course it sounds derogatory, and yes, it only works if you incorrectly pronounce the word “Wang,” when the proper pronunciation is closer to “Wong.”
Though he is always present in a friend group, it’s not hard to tell that nobody truly notices him and gives him attention. His “best friend” Fahad (Raul Dial) doesn’t so much respect Chris as a peer he relies on and is happy to be with, but more like “a little” who he can bring around with him so folks can think he’s “a big.” Even when he moves over to an older group of guys who skateboard, even when it touches on his own interest in skateboarding, he’s treated as the guy who points the camcorder at them doing tricks. Chris isn’t seen or loved, he’s used.
This angst is further complicated at home. He’s surrounded by his on-her-way-to-college sister Vivian (Shirley Chen), his hobbyist painter mother (Joan Chen), and his chiding nǎi nai (Chang Li Hua, Sean Wang’s real-life grandma and one of the stars of his recently Oscar-nominated documentary short film Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó). His dad is making money back in Taiwan, busy with his job and never seen or heard from in the film. He butts heads with his sister and the air in the family household is constantly tense, with Dad not being around resulting in a thorny dynamic between mother and nǎi nai. Much of the Mandarin dialogue in these family scenes are written with an all-too-familiar level of dramatic humor and heavy weight of pressure. With nǎi nai being Chris’ father’s mother, her very presence in the house suggests strong disapproval and disgust with his mother. When Chris fights with his sister, it’s his mother’s fault for not raising them properly. It makes home a place he never wants to be at. No matter how hard the mother works and how much love she gives, the love just simply doesn’t translate over to Chris. Though some of these family sequences can feel frustrating, it is clear that Chris is at the age where he’s not looking for acceptance from family, but from peers.
Wang captures this level of stress to a funny and uncomfortable level, as he integrates us back into the world of the early 2000s, seeing young teenagers go through their AIMs to their Myspaces and Facebooks. It’s cringe message after cringe photo upload after cringe text. The experience can only be described as a crossover of Eighth Grade and PEN15. Chris, like most boys his age, tries desperately to impress his crush Madi (Mahaela Park). During these social interactions, Wang walks a delicate balance between adorable and awkward. It seems like the fate of the world rests on deciding whether to end your message with a “<3” or a “:)” to a girl. But while most romantic comedies use that awkwardness to make us root for the couple to get together, Wang channels Bo Burnham in his writing, as he explores these relationships from the lens of how temporary they are in the grand scheme of things, despite being the most important thing in the world for our teenage lead.
Some of Chris’ lowest points in the film are definitely heartbreaking. Worst part about it is it seems like everything is always his fault. After we have spent what feels like the whole summer of 2008 with him, we can only hope that he doesn’t stray further into despair. Balancing the looming sense of low self-esteem is the ever-present feeling of being cared for. In Wang’s Dìdi, there is a feeling that time is always moving forward. Chris is growing up and experiencing so much so fast, that as things move on, maybe he begins to notice the non-moving pillars in his life. While he is constantly changing as a person, his mother remains exactly the same, looking after him to make sure he’s well-fed and happy and safe, on the good days and the bad days.
Perhaps that is where Wang’s sincerity is coming from, portraying love in an Asian family as an impenetrable rock. Both Izaac Wang and Joan Chen are up to the task of portraying both that pain and that level of understanding. The way both of them deliver words like “ashamed” or “proud” or “stubborn” speaks deeply, as Izaac Wang’s shaky sense of self-worth is held together by Chen’s unwavering affection. The result is a messy, frustrating, but beautiful and realistic portrayal of an immigrant Asian woman and her American-born son. Both Wang and Chen deliver fantastic performances, down to the last shot that will bring tears to your eyes. Certainly, it made me recall my teenage years where I fought with my mother, but then she had the gift of continuing on and taking care of me as if nothing’s changed. As for me, I was just like Chris – not “stubborn enough” to remain angry. And that is probably the most beautiful part of Dìdi, of Sean Wang reminding us that everyone goes through hell at different points in their lives. But our lives and desires change as we get older, and hopefully in time, we will become true to ourselves and be inspirational figures to the next generation.
Coming-of-age stories tend to have these sorts of epiphanies in their formula. Through a series of vignettes and conflicting desires coming from our teenage lead, the film helps them learn something bigger about themselves and what kind of person they want to be or should be. Sean Wang certainly doesn’t shy away from this formula, but it is thanks to his aesthetic, attention to detail, and immigrant lens that helps give the familiar story a fresh new perspective. It’s all for the better, because thanks to Wang, Dìdi is more than just a coming-of-age movie. It’s an embarrassingly honest portrait of the Bay Area American-born Chinese Millennial.
Grade: B+
This review is from the 2024 SXSW Film Festival. Focus Features will release Dìdi in theaters on May 26, 2024.
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