If you are looking for a refreshing, feel-good movie theater experience, take a trip to go see Crazy Rich Asians. Personally, I am immensely happy that films that represent other cultures are making their way to the big screen and are successful while doing it. As a viewer that does not identify with the culture and practices of the characters in the film, I still found myself identifying with certain aspects of the characters’ lives that reminded me of my own family’s characteristics. Even the practices and character traits that were unfamiliar to me did not feel like I was missing something nor as if I were on the outside of an inside joke.
Crazy Rich Asians follows couple Rachel Chu (played by Constance Wu) and Nick Young (played by Henry Golding) as they venture off to Singapore to attend Nick’s best friend’s wedding. This trip marks Rachel’s first time that she has met any of Nick’s family and she quickly learns the reason the Young family are nearly celebrities in Singapore: they’re rich! After meeting many family members and family friends of the Youngs, Rachel is immediately ostracized since Nick Young is desired by many. Rachel’s relationship (or lack thereof) with Nick’s mother starts off poorly, as Eleanor Young (played by Michelle Yeoh) is highly critical and extremely protective of her son.
The parallels between the dynamic of Rachel and Eleanor’s “head butting” relationship manifests itself in a game of mahjong that they engage in towards the end of the film, which was exciting to follow along with, even though I do not play mahjong myself. This scene is also one of the only times Rachel’s character trait of being a game design professor at NYU comes into play. The game of mahjong and the “game” of navigating the tricky waters of the Young family that Rachel has to traverse is not the only parallel present in the film. Earlier in the film, Eleanor Young reveals that even her relationship with Ah Ma, her mother-in-law, was never a good nor supportive one. We, as the audience, are under the impression that Eleanor Young will have a change of heart, but instead, this history feeds into that same unsupportive relationship with our protagonist, Rachel. In fact, Eleanor goes out of her way to investigate Rachel’s past and reveals to Rachel and Nick the truth about Rachel’s mother’s past: Rachel’s mother cheated on her husband and ran away to America with her lover and her child, who was Rachel. Even though Nicky is furious with his mother and ends up proposing to Rachel, Rachel denies, and then we end up in that mahjong game I mentioned before. By the end of the film, we learn that Rachel’s mother’s husband was abusive and Eleanor has a change of heart about Rachel.
As a romantic comedy, Crazy Rich Asians is somewhat predictable and not much of a departure from what we are used to seeing from romantic comedies. Although I am a big proponent of watching films in movie theaters whenever possible, I do not think you would miss out on an important aspect of the viewing experience of this movie if you didn’t. I’m sure anyone would just as much enjoy watching the feel-good Crazy Rich Asians from the comfort of their own home as they would in a movie theater.
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