Micah Moore asked me to present some information about movie stereotypes as they relate to Asian Americans. He writes:
What would be really helpful to filmmakers is you giving specific examples of known films (from any territory) that you do respect. Films that got it right in your opinion. And why. It would be great if you could include both films with characters that are all identified as part of only one culture, and also examples with multi-cultural casts.
Then also it would be great if you could point out the films that offend you and why. I would only humbly ask that you limit it to films that you have actually watched, as I’m sure some filmmakers would like to be very accurate and specific in their research.
Since so many people have done it better than I can, I thought it might be a good idea to link up a site that covers stereotypes in depth. So if the producers of Dogs want to read a good primer on stereotypes, go to the stereotypes page on the MANAA website. This article is very old, probably around ten years or so, but it all still applies–filmmakers can go down the list and check off the Orientalist stereotypes that their work embodies. Outside of the stereotype issue, MANAA also covers other issues related to Hollywood.
As far as my own tastes, I like 3 dimensional portrayals. I usually see them in literature more often than in film, although there are also good films. I don’t care so much about the storylines as the portrayals. Here are some good 3 dimensional media portrayals:
1. Double Happiness with Sandra Oh (mostly Asian cast)
2. The first season of Heroes with Masi Oka. (The ”Hiro” portrayal is as good in subsequent seasons, but the series itself became annoying as hell, especially after they brought back Sylar after the whole “Save the cheerleader, save the world shtick. I felt robbed. Mostly white cast.)
3. Cho in the Mentalist (almost all white cast)
4. ALL of the Asian American portrayals in Greg Pak’s Robot Stories
If you want to read good books, check out Bananaboys, the Jade Peony, and any short story by Gish Jen . If you want a good portrayal by a White author, check out the Lover by Marguerite Duras (read the book, don’t see the movie.)
In all of the above, the characters are three dimensional–real people, real emotions, real scenarios. And they all deviate from the usual “White is Right” mentality of Hollywood.
I know that we’re beginning a new dialogue, but I would urge filmmakers and creative people to ask hard questions of the system they see. Why does Hollywood consider an Asian female unsuitable to play the same deep roles that white women do? Why are there so few Asian men playing opposite Asian women (or black men playing opposite black women, for that matter). Filmmakers, white and non-white, should ask themselves: is there something real below the surface that I’m not seeing? Do Asian Americans exist outside of the “I’m an Asian woman who needs to escape from Chinatown to shack up with a White Guy” or “I’m an Asian guy incapable of being anything other than a tool to show a White Guy’s human sensitivity” storylines?
I think if filmmakers asked these questions, they’d be surprised by what they find.
No related posts.
But here is an...
I agree with everything you said. About #1…I think...
Cool man, thanks for posting these examples. I will study them. If you have any more personal commentary on why you think those specific characters are so appealing to your sensibilities and cause, I’d love to find out more details.
There is no doubting your observation on the amount cultural bias in the film industry. I’d like to illustrate later in this post that some films like Last Samurai are actually more idiotic than you might think. And I’d like to offer industry insight that can aid your cause.
Hollywood awkwardly shoves white leads into stories they don’t logically belong in for the sake of soul-less profit and target demographics.
Some indy writers like creating leads that represent their own inner fantasies or fantastical ambitions, which often leads to irrational premises.
These are huge and common problems in the industry and we should look at ways to address them. I mean right here and now, too, in this thread.
On the other hand I’d implore you to consider there are rare exceptions to every rule and some films that outwardly seem to have irresponsible cliche elements, on closer inspection, actually have logical appropriate casting based on the rational details in the story. Real individuals usually have one of two aspects that randomly and coincidentally fit a sterotype, and many more aspects that defy stereotypes. This is bound to sometimes occur in films as well.
For instance, Tears of the Sun has a lot of specific logical details that justify the casting and setting, even though the result is a white lead fighting against people of a different skin tone and rescuing a woman of a different ethnicity.
Films like Last Samurai, Bangkok Dangerous Nic Cage version, Tokyo Drift, and many others, on the other hand, defy logic simply to satisfy the unfair industry demand.
Some films walk a very fine subtle line.
So I’ve been trying to combine your concerns over industry discrimination with my own to start developing a litmus test. It’s incomplete but here’s what I have so far….
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EVALUATING CULTURAL SENSATIONALISM and STORY-TELLING ABILITY in DRAMATIC FILM
1. STORY VS INDUSTRY – Is the lead character justified in the story, or is he just awkwardly stuffed into the story to satisfy audience demographics and film maker bias?
2. LOGIC VS FANCY – Is the story rational and do the characters all make logical sense in their actions and outcomes? Or is reason ignored and logic stretched in order to progress the status and actions of some characters? Are all characters effected equally by the same rules of the films universe?
3. RESPONSIBILITY VS GLORIFICATION – Are the themes responsible? Are the characters defined by cultural stereotypes or their personal lifestyles and individual choices. Are characters ultimately punished for criminal behaviour, prejudice, and violence, or are they ultimately rewarded? Is there value shown in noble acts and positive character traits such as universal love, kindness, and tolerance? Are the positive and negative character traits universal, or singling out specific groups of people?
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When we see a film like Last Samurai, it doesn’t only piss us off from a standpoint of cultural appreciation, but our brains actually hurt because of the faulty logic in story-telling. Not only the overt irrationality like a alcoholic civil war hero sailing to Japan to become the Last Samurai (which would be equivalent to an alcoholic Japanese samurai sailing to America to win the civil war and free the slaves – to put it into perspective for the white film audience), but far more subtle irrational story-telling devices are also screaming at our subconscious.
As a screenwriter, I can help identify them. Ignore ethnicity for a moment. Tom Cruise is an alcoholic douchebag in a village of pretty cool people. Yet a seemingly-mentally-healthy woman from the village falls in love with his deeply flawed and abrasive character instead of more worthy available suitors. (On top of that did Tomcat kill her husband? I can’t remember).
Anyway, Tom is mentored in sword-fighting and learns mastery way too quickly but that happens in most Asian martial arts films too so I’ll let that plot gap slide.
Whereas all the worthy characters who are superior warriors die, Tom Cruise outlives all of them on the battlefield. And at the end of the film he is awarded and recognized, by pretty much by everyone including the emperor of Japan. Despite Tom embracing a violent lifestyle, he ends up better off than he began, instead of deep haunted by his experiences of tragedy.
Tokyo Drift is guilty of choosing a lead based on box office and not artistic justification, but that wouldn’t be the case if the white actor was an actual drift racing expert and stuntman, and could do the racing without having to resort to American-action-style editing, he’d be a justified casting choice – like choosing a martial arts lead based on his individual talents, a practice done in MA films more than any other genre.
That said, Tokyo drift latches onto the Western pop-culture impression of the Yakuza, on the heels of fantastical films like Kill Bill (where a part Chinese/Japanese/American woman defies logic and becomes head of the Yakuza). The logic of the characters in Tokyo Drift is actually much better than in Last Samurai. The girlfriend of ANY gangster obviously has mental health issues and either no wisdom or self-destructive tendencies. It makes sense that she is submissive to any male figure. The douchebag antagonist has slightly more character flaws than the douchebag protagonist, and so it makes sense he’d be beat at the end.
In the end the film is not morally responsible, because the lead, a criminal illegal street racer who’s hobby endangers the lives of innocent people without concern is rewarded instead of paying a price for his ill behaviour.
My point is that racism and prejudice are illogical points of view, and thus prejudiced writers usually lack the brain power to even write stories with rational plot points and logical characters. But if you ever see a film maker that swears by logical details , and is therefore likely to carefully justify all his casting, characters and storylines, I feel we should watch their films extra-carefully before rushing to judgment. Because chances are they had a lot of these concerns in mind all during pre-production and production.
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I think the greatest tragedy and problem IS NOT stereotypes in the media (even though that’s a problem), but rather the MUTED VOICES OF MINORITY GROUPS FROM LACKING THE POWER OF PRODUCTION AND EQUAL ACCESS TO CHANNELS OF MASS MEDIA.
Stereotypes will probably be around for a long time. I respect what Byron is doing to try to counter them. But from my industry insight, i think the more crucial effort is not fighting to change the few Asian roles from stereotypical to positive and unique, but rather finding out how to add as many positive Asian
faces to the media as possible. What would be good to me is seeing an equal amount of lime light in films, and everyone having the opportunity to play heroes, anti-heroes, and villains – since there’d be an equal amount of screen time for all, it would hopefully less racially provocative when you see a white lead or an Asian bad guy, since there’d be an equal amount of Asian leads and white bad guys.
To achieve this, we’ll have to, as Suntze would say, know our enemy. Study the conventions, and then find ways that you can produce something that satisfies the needs of the industry while upholding your message and values. Remember that the first color Hollywood sees is not white but green. If you sold the biggest box office ticket ever tomorrow with an Asian lead, the rest of the year would be filled with Asian leads. Hollywood is operating on outdated quantitative business formulas.
Infiltrate the business power side (investment). Fill the ground level network side (production crew). And put your eggs in the baskets that are most cherished by the industry – general action and effects-heavy sci fi films – they make the most money.
Also, the crew thing is real important. There aren’t enough minority production crew members in most regions of the US. Having more might create an ambient influence on the production of each film, and put more quality production power in the hand of minority groups. Blake and I and Andy have all been DP’s, sound guys, and gaffers on other-wise all minority crews who would prefer all-minority crews in order to better empower their muted voice and artistic vision to the public. But there’s just not enough high-caliber minority crew in our state despite having a good amount of minority above-the-line-people (actors, writers, producers, etc). Controlling the media production equipment and finding talented operators is something some minority film groups in our area are lacking. There’s some white and multi-ethnic groups lacking it too, but I’m focusing on how to empower muted voices.
Also, I would cherish hearing this blogs regular poster’s give their thoughts on Slum Dog Millionaire.
Hey Byron I took a look at the stereotypes page to contrast it with my recent feature film.
First I think it’s a great list and important.
Only two of the points come close to fitting the elements of my film, but only when taken out of context.
1. The role of Asians as gangsters. My film is a gangster noir. Everyone is gangsters, the whites, blacks, and Asians. It’s been apparent to the general audience that it’s a movie about the microcosm of gangsters, not a movie about broader social circles where only one group is shown as gangsters.
2. Asians relegated to supporting roles in projects with Asian or Asian American content. Now this is an extremely important point, and it happens way too much for stupid reasons in the film industry. But it’s also presuming absolutes, and not taking into account that it’s possible for stories to logically justify having a lead in a disparate background. As rarely as that’s actually justified. In most of our films, we’ve had non-whites as heroic leads in a disparate background.
Unlike the bogus white deliverer stories cited (Seven Years in Tibet, the Last Samurai) the backdrop in Dogs is equally the Mafia and the Triad, and very briefly a black gang. The casting of the vile lead character could go either way without effecting the story so long as there was a Juliet from the other side for the Romeo character. The love interest would be a submissive character regardless because organized crime is a sexist industry (or institution if you prefer).
We ended up deciding which side would provide the lead and which side would provide the mistress when we got access to Huyen Thi, the best actor we could possibly get, and Eric Jacobus, the best choreographer we could get and recognized in indy MA film circles around the world. If it weren’t for Eric and Huyen, we’d probably just have our forth film where Brian Lee plays a bad-ass who rescues another white girl qho throws herself at him. But because of finding Eric and Huyen, we were able to raise the bar both in acting and in stunts and fighting. However, Brian Lee is still in the film and has sex with white women who throw themselves at him. It’s basically in his contract.
Those are the subtle distinctions that validate or void those most likely concerns in regards to this specific film. I’d say the film is almost opposite to the other concerns, considering how careful we were to define the characters by their lifestyles and instead of cultural references or stereotypes.
What I have realized in reading your suggested material is that some people will pass off an Asian guy as a stereotype just because that INDIVIDUAL is randomly good at math, just because he has one aspect that coincidentally fits society’s stereotypes – people will also unfairly judge our film because they’ll just take facets out of context and assume it’s stereotypical. But just like that Asian guy, who is actually Ray Carbonel who defies so many stereotypes, especially when it comes to his giant dong – our film also defies stereotypes when held up to close hot inspection.
Just to quickly address the rest of the points regarding my film. If you have time to read this Byron you’ll be pretty well caught up on details of the film for our podcast.
1. Asian Americans as foreigners who cannot be assimilated. The Asian, white, and black characters are the exact same in my film and all integrated into American culture, admittedly to the point of robbing them of unique cultural references. Admittedly the Triad boss mainly speaks Mandarin, but that’s because the best actor we could get mainly speaks Mandarin. Wei is the most assimilated character in the film (including the Italian guys) and drags the awkward unsocial Jack out to night clubs and multicultural circles.
2. Asian cultures as inherently predatory. Even though all my white and Asian and black characters are gangsters engage in criminal activities, none of them are usurping communal resources or spreading their influence out beyond their criminal organizations.
3. Asian Americans restricted to clichéd occupations. Like I mentioned above it’s a gangster noir, so all the characters – Asian, white, and Black – are gangsters. Since it’s also a martial arts film, using The Triad helps justify the martial arts tradition with the Triad characters, considering the roots of the Triad go back to Chinese defenders fighting off the Manchus (who I obviously have issues with as a student of Southern 5 Animal Styles, since the Qing’s razed the Shaolin Temple in Hunan). These events are often romanticized in Chinese MA flicks as “The Boxer Rebellion.” Unfortunately the rebel groups evolved into crime syndicates. Even in recent history there’s cultural heroes like master Pan Qing who was used to bust Triads in the 70′s, and employed his martial arts background.
4. Asian racial features, names, accents, or mannerisms as inherently comic or sinister. I purposefully defined all my characters – Asian, white and black by universal characteristics of the human condition – giving them all the exact same character flaws – and avoided cultural stereotypes. For names and language I turned to a respected Chinese film maker to handle those sections.
5. Asians relegated to supporting roles in projects with Asian or Asian American content. I explain this above at length so I’ll spare you the reiteration.
6. Asian male sexuality as negative or non-existent. Wei is a smooth operator who can seduce most anyone – a white girl throws herself at him and he takes her up on it. Boss Wu has a harem of classy mistresses and loves Jin the most. Lord Massimo, the Italian mafioso, is a pedophile with a stable of schoolgirls. But Jack is pretty nervous and timid with women. He’s unable to seal the deal with a white girl and only able to really consummate with Jin because she aggressively instigates the situation.
7. Unmotivated white-Asian romance. In my case, it’s motivated by personal psychology and Jack’s individuality apart from the crime family institutions regarding gender roles. Basically, Jack’s a lonely suicidal individual with no family or friends that desperately wants to be accepted and appreciated. To be needed and have someone to protect is even better. Jin was foolish as a girl and wound up in a bad situation as a gangster’s mistress, but has grown up. Jack’s only two positive traits is that he doesn’t see her as an object like both gangster organizations do, and her skin tone makes no difference to him. This makes him attractive to her.
8. Asian women as “China dolls.” Because all the male characters are machcentric gangsters, it’s only logical that most of the girls are submissive and have psychological issues. That said, the white mistresses are much more cartoonish, dressed in schoolgirl outfits, while the Asian mistresses are classy but bland, wearing conventional modern day American dresses (except for one Qi Pao one of the actors brought for herself in one scene). But one of the Triad women is a loyal badass who’s proven herself in the man’s world of organized crime. There’s no equivalent white female character.
9. Asian women as “dragon ladies.” The one badass Asian female character is loyal and capable, but not scheming, untrustworthy, or back-stabbing. She’s not at all a “dragon lady.”
10. Asians who prove how good they are by sacrificing their lives. This just doesn’t happen in the film at all. A lot of white, Asian and some black guys get killed by other white and Asian guys, but no Asian characters sacrifice themselves.
11. Asian Americans as the “model minority.” The film’s a crime noir. There’s no model people in it at all.
12. Asianness as an “explanation” for the magical or supernatural. There’s no supernatural stuff in the film. We don’t even go into deeper aspects of soft martial arts.
13. Anti-Asian racial slurs going unchallenged. Well, everyone who’s racist in the film dies, whether they are white, Asian, or black. The gang war starts when one racist white guy (the Mafioso’s son) attacks an innocent Asian guy verbally and physically and the Asian guy defends himself in the lethal attack. Not knowing the death of his son was self-defense, the Mafia leader starts killing Triad guys, and the Triad guys interpret it as a racist attack. Thus one racist, some mob mentality, and
14. Asian arts as negative when practiced by Asians but positive when practiced by whites. Well, there’s a lot of martial arts in the film, and since the characters are all professional killers, they all use it for evil. There’s only three instances to the contrary: when Wei defends himself against his racist attacker; when Wei – who’s tolerant of all cultures – defends himself against a prejudiced fighter known as The General; and at the very end, when Jack tries to save Jin from the gangsters. Up until that point, all the violence in the film by Jack and the other white characters, and the Asian characters is used for evil.
There are no other “cultural arts” in the film.
15. Lead Asian roles labeled “Amerasian” or “Eurasian” solely to accommodate white actors. Like I said, almost all our films feature non-white heroic leads. This film’s lead is a bad guy, and could have accommodated any skin tone but it worked to cast the best choreographer available and the best lead actress available.
16. What, no Asians? Well obviously no one’s arguing this to be the problem. We provide ample opportunities for all ethnicities in our films. In the past all the minority roles have generally been heroic leads. But this time all the white and black and Asian actors had the opportunity to play very dark juicy dramatic roles.
Oops in point 13, I meant to finish…1 racist, some mob mentality, and a big misunderstanding leads to a full blown war. This is why we should always get the full story and details and not assume stuff.
Another thing to keep in mind–there’s doesn’t always exist an equivalent counter-claim. If you make a joke about black people eating watermelon, it doesn’t have the same historical connotations as if that black person were to make a joke about you eating escargot. So I’m not sure if the “everyone has stereotypes” argument is valid within our particular historical context.
Byron Byron Byron (I sincerely love you, man, but:).
I didn’t say the characters all had stereotypes and thus were equal. That would be really ignorant. Please don’t paint me to be that stupid.
I said all the characters are purposefully devoid of stereotypes and only defined by universal emotional traits and therefore were equal.
Every point you’ve made on it’s own is totally valid and true, it’s just that they don’t apply to our latest film in context under close scrutiny. I understand you don’t want to waste your time watching 99 unfair stereotypical films just to find 1 that intentionally defies the stereotypes that it’s genre is usually guilty of.
But that doesn’t mean that 1 is like the other 99.
If you saw the film, there might be some things that offend you, but a lot of the elements you are imagining to be in this specific film just aren’t there. And that was done on purpose.
I’ve long understood the CH-word is equivalent to the N-word. And comments like “me love you long time” would be like saying “yousa go fetch massa some food, boy” to a black individual. And I understand that in our society, slurs against white people aren’t really as heavy and hurtful, because they don’t usually have discriminatory actions in tow, and there’s plenty of positive representation of white ethnicity in films for every white villain or white stereotype.
As a media student and outside perspective, let me tell you that even though the actual effect of stereotypes between white people in America and minorities is immeasurably different…when BCB engages in slurs and stereotypes like “cracker” and “faggot” and “fratboy”, the OUTSIDE audience (rightly or not) will either assume they are welcoming an “anything-goes” form of satire, or that they aren’t serious about their message of ending stereotypes. Even though America sucks more for you and unfairly give me preference, saying “you stereotypical fratboys shouldn’t make a film with Asian’s playing a stereotypical role like gangsters” or “you cracker faggots should stop being so Orientalist” isn’t a good way to express your message if you hope to influence film makers outside your identity.
The community of Asian talent here respect Blake and I – not because we’re paying them to be our friends, or because they are cultural sellouts – but because we regularly offer roles for heroic Asian protagonists, AND because we occasionally offer dark villain roles for Asian talent as well. We don’t limit to one or the other – and neither type of role is stereotypical the way we handle them. The Asian actors here would be pissed off if I limited them to only one type of role because of your concerns. In fact I’d be guilty of what that website listed as “Asians as a model minority” which is another form of stereotype.
About Slumdog Millionaire: Most people on the 44s thought it was a great movie. They’re young people though. Most of the people here are older people with kids, so we don’t get out so much. I love the trailer for that film, I love the ideas and conversations it has generated, but sadly, I haven’t seen it yet either.
I’m dying to see Obsessed as well.
Other than the historical context, one other thing I’d like to mention–I think it’s possible to be a 3 dimensional character within a gangster role. Have you seen some of those old Chow Yun Fat movies? The one where he blinds the woman resonated with me (though it’s been so long that I’ve forgotten everything about the movie.).
when BCB engages in slurs and stereotypes like “cracker” and “faggot” and “fratboy”, the OUTSIDE audience (rightly or not) will either assume they are welcoming an “anything-goes” form of satire, or that they aren’t serious about their message of ending stereotypes.
Point taken. In Vu’s defense, I don’t think it was him who said words like “cracker” or “faggot.” It’s just the people who commented after him. People say all kinds of things on the web, and you have a choice–give some leeway, or put your blog on lockdown. “Fratboy” is a stereotype, it describes a particular behavior, and I’ve known some fratboys in my time, even Asian fratboys who act like fratboys.
By the way, I really am interested in learning about some of the other roles that you’ve created. Hopefully we can still have that actors podcast after you, me, Blake, Eva, and Vu talk.
No doubt, man. What you said just now about fratboys not being culturally-exclusive, but rather defined by their chosen lifestyle, please understand I approached my feature film the same for gangsters. And even if a white guy is a frat boy, he’s not being necessarily being stereotypical – it’s just that one of his individual aspects and interests happens to match society’s stereotypical expectations.
And sometimes things just defy our expectations in rare form. Like for instance I assume you’re better at math than me, but that’s not because I believe in stereotypes. It’s because I have a learning disability with numbers and failed almost all my math classes. I am however aware there’s a small chance you could have a greater struggle with mathematics than me, and would have been the only one in any of my classes. But you have to look at the specific situation to know whether I’m using stereotypes or individual logic when I make such a statement.
I’ll try to get some more examples of work online. I had to move cities due to financial situations and our presence on the web is a complete mess.
I think you’ll dig Slumdog. The director Danny Boyle is English, and they do paint a pretty disturbing face of India’s backstreets and some individual policemen, but I have a feeling there was some multicultural input in the film considering the credits and the majority of positive Indian response. I believe that sort of multi-perspective input in shaping a film is important. In the end it’s a love story overcoming tremendous odds, something right up my alley, and a theme we all relate to.
Oh obviously the leads in Slumdog are actually Indian too, and “no-names”. Which I think makes it a crucial step for theatrical progress over here.
We usually only get wuxia flicks, and even they have stars mass America recognizes, like Chow Yun Fat and Jet Li.
Micah, I appreciate your willingness to engage here and to shed light on your thoughts and insights into the industry. I actually subscribe to the belief that Asian Americans need to take control themselves and make the kinds of films that THEY want. And if they’re successful enough going the indie route, then they can gain a foothold inside Hollywood and slowly chip away at the system from within.
Anyway, one film that I thought got it right was David Ren’s “Shanghai Kiss” because you had Asian American actors as the leads (Ken Leung and Kelly Hu) playing complex characters—NOT caricatures and stereotypes. You get to see the main character’s humanity, and yet it wasn’t an exclusively Asian cast (Hayden Panetierre)….it was just a seemingly normal cast in its racial make up that you or I might encounter in real life. And the movie dealt with themes that I thought might strike a nerve with how a lot of Asian American males might feel caught between two worlds.
A second film that I think got it done right was George Huang’s “Swimming with Sharks”(Kevin Spacey, Frank Whaley) not so much in its story….it has nothing to do with Asian Americans, but rather Hollywood and working for a studio. Here was a guy who wrote and directed his own movie. He made the movie he WANTED to make using $15,000 of his own money to start out with. He went the indie route. And this goes back to what has been said before about taking control ourselves and not waiting around for Hollywood.
Thanks for the kind words Mojorider, and the suggestions with good details about why you value them. I’ll check em out. I think you made a great point about groups needing a bigger voice taking control of production resources and strategizing ways to infiltrate the mainstream channels/system. I hope to get into that with Blake and Byron on the podcast.
Respect.
Hey Jaehwan – just checked out the stereotypes page on the MANAA website. Interesting read, thanks for pointing it out. Looking forward to the podcast.
By the way, Cho on the Mentalist is the shit. I would kill to get a chance to work with that guy. I love how he never has to show how bad ass he is. You can just tell by the way he carries himself that it’s best not to fuck with him. This is probably my favorite show on TV right now. Very well developed supporting characters that add so much to the overall appeal. Great premise for a show as well.
Cool deal, Blake. Looking forward to the podcast.
BTW, “Cho” (Tim Kang) is in that “Robot Stories” movie I mentioned. Definitely check him out in that feature. He plays a sensitive type in RS. He went from sensitive lover in RS to badass in the Mentalist. I’m totally amazed by the guy’s range.
Micah,
I’m going to see if I can rent Slumdog sometime soon.
i haven’t seen Slumdog either. Looking forward to it, though.
Oh, and if I may indulge, there’s a great quote from Ken Leung’s character in “Shanghai Kiss”. He’s a character struggling between his bi-culturalness of being Asian American, caught between two worlds. He goes back to Shanghai and begins to feel a connectedness to a heritage he knows nothing about, to take care of property that his grandmother left him and he says, “In Los Angeles, I’m that Chinese guy. Here, I’m just a guy.”