Written by Althea Ocomen and edited by Humyra Karim
Crazy Rich Asians was just the beginning of revolutionary change. The first major Hollywood film in 25 years to start a majority-Asian cast, the adaptation of Kevin Kwan's 2013 novel soon also claimed the title of the most successful rom-com in a decade, earning praise from the majority of netizens for the diverse cast and storyline. The movie wasn't perfect—what rom-com truly is?—but for viewers whose stories have been isolated from Hollywood's western media, it suggested a shift. To Hollywood, meanwhile, its success proved the influence of the Asian American market, catalyzed by online movements, like #GoldOpen, to get people to theaters. Echoing the sentiment around Black Panther, Director Jon M. Chu stated, "It’s not a movie, it’s a movement."
Chu's film marked an exceptional turning point for modern Asian American film representation. Netflix dropped the wholesome romance To All the Boys I've Loved Before starring Vietnamese-American Lana Condor as she navigates her life as a teenager. In theaters soon after came Searching, an internet-driven tale of a father looking for his missing daughter, which made John Cho the first Asian American actor to lead a major thriller. In May, Netflix released Always Be My Maybe, a food-focused rom-com featuring Ali Wong, Randall Park, and a litany of other Asian Americans as a part of the secondary cast.
With the release of Lulu Wang's The Farewell, the current push for Asian American representation has continued its success. The Farewell stars Awkwafina as a Chinese-born American immigrant who returns to China to visit her family's dying matriarch, who hasn't been told she's dying. Hailed for its excellence and humanity, the movie has already brought in the 2019 largest per-theater average ($87,833), per theater, unseating Avengers: Endgame. As Wang recently told the Atlantic, The Farewell has been met with emotional responses from viewers who see their family dynamics reflected.
The rise of streaming platforms such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and YouTube has greatly encouraged Hollywood to rethink its strategy in featuring a diverse cast or storyline. Both Netflix and Amazon have produced and acquired locally authentic content in Southeast Asia, through exposing U.S. viewers to a variety of foreign content they have not yet seen. Recognizing the rise of inclusion and diversity in Hollywood films, allows viewers to see the beauty of other cultures and traditions outside their environment.
Southeast Asian Films
TOTO (2015)
Sid Lucero received the Best Actor award at the 19th Los Angeles Comedy Festival for his extraordinary role in TOTO, a film that takes an often light-hearted look at the Filipino obsession with the American dream. The sole breadwinner of his family, Antonio “Toto” Estares works at a Manila hotel as a room attendant. Desperate to earn a visa and move to America, Estares enters one harebrained scheme after the other, putting himself, his relationships, and his dignity at risk in pursuit of his aspirations.
Himala (1982)
Receiver of the Bronze Hugo Award at the 19th Chicago Film Festival and a Viewer’s Choice Award at the CNN Asia Pacific Screen Awards in 2008, Himala follows the story of a young girl in a remote northern village, whose hallucinations of the Virgin Mary cause a stir in her village. The movie was filmed in just three weeks, and stars much-loved Filipino actress Nora Aunor, in what many netizens rate as the best performance of her career.
Ong Bak: Muay Thai Warrior
Ong Bak: Muay Thai Warrior, a 2003 martial arts film, was arguably the first movie to properly display what one of these fights actually looked like. It made waves in cinemas across the United States where the film was known as Ong-Back: The Thai Warrior.
Chocolate
The plot follows a young girl named Zen (JeeJa Yanin Vismistananda) as she becomes a skilled fighter by watching Ong Bak and by imitating fighters at the Muay Thai gym adjacent to her home. When her mother is diagnosed with cancer, Zen takes it upon herself to collect her mother’s debts in order to pay for her treatment, and she quickly finds that her acquired Muay Thai skills come in handy in handling difficult situations. The film was greatly praised for its wonderful performance, and was heavily complimented by harsh critics.
TV Shows and Movies With Southeast Asian Characters
Float
A Disney/Pixar film featuring the first-ever all-Filipino computer-generated imagery (CGI) lead characters. It is presented as a story of acceptance. It is a story of how a father discovers that his son floats, which makes him different from other kids. When his son’s ability becomes public, the dad must decide whether to run and hide or to accept his son as he is. This movie is seen as a chance to celebrate children with unique gifts.
Urduja (2008)
This is an exceptional film about indigenous cultures. Urduja is the Disney Filipino film that never was. Voiced by an all-Filipino cast that includes the likes of Eddie Garcia and Cesar Montano, the film is based on the legend of the warrior princess Urduja.
Amphibia
Thai-American cartoonist Matt Braly, the creator of Disney’s latest cartoon, "Amphibia," stars Disney’s first Thai-American character Ann Boonchuy. Braly told NBC News: “From the very inception of the project, she was always going to be Thai, and it was something that where when I was growing up, there just wasn’t any kind of Southeast Asian representation on screen, whether that’s animated or not.” Accordingly, animators are trying to emphasize specificity in cultural representation in order to introduce their viewers to that culture in detail.
Because of Netflix’s development in their films, Hollywood's shift towards Southeast Aisan stories doesn't show signs of slowing down. Less recognized but also in theaters is Stuber, a buddy-cop movie starring half-Filipino Dave Bautista. The current movement is definitely worth the praise it's accumulated, with netizens supporting its development along the way.
Modern media has increasingly shown better representation for South East Asians, but the above films are some of the best, and have inspired countless Asians to step into the spotlight and to step up on hollywood. All of them have defied multiple stereotypes, paving the way for Southeast Asian kids in the popular media to have a place in mainstream Hollywood and to place Southeast Asian representation as a main objective of the filming industry. Through the exposure of different films, these Southeast Asian kids realize that they are no longer buried in Hollywood’s whitewashing or yellowface. They recognize that they are seen and heard in popular media.
Sources
Cover Photo/Art sourced from Disney +
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