What do you get when you cross the strong female friendship, barrels of laughs and unravelling of rivalry and secrets found in Bridesmaids and Girls Trip with the sheer excitement of Asian camaraderie in Crazy Rich Asians and Everything Everywhere All at Once? The brilliant, brand new addition to the growing list of films doing wonders for Asian representation on the big screen: Joy Ride.
Directed by Crazy Rich Asians screenwriter Adele Lim and written by Cherry Chevapravatdumrong of Family Guy fame and Teresa Hsiao who co-created Awkwafina Is Nora from Queens, Joy Ride tells the story of the child of adoptive White parents and successful lawyer Audrey and her best childhood friend artist Lolo who travel to Beijing to close a deal for Audrey’s firm. Along tags Lolo’s cousin “Deadeye” whose job isn’t mentioned but they are a big K-Pop fan. There they meet Audrey’s college roommate Kat who is now a famous actress and so a trip across both the Chinese capital and countryside (Haiqing, though I’m not exactly sure where that is and can’t find anything about the place), and eventually Seoul, South Korea ensues (not Shanghai, even though the poster shows it in the background).
For Audrey, played by Ashley Park (Mindy in Emily in Paris), it is also a journey of unintentional self-discovery as she – with the “help” of Lolo (Sherry Cola – not her full real name – the new, hilarious alternative to Awkwafina, showing there are more Asian actresses available for big blockbuster roles) – searches for her birth mother, if only to help close the deal with her firm’s Beijing partners. I’m not quite sure if pressuring people into sharing everything about their family background is something that is done in business, but knowing how nosy many Asians are about others, it’s also not highly unsurprising and makes you wonder how easy it really is for K-Pop stars to cross borders without passports.
Stephanie Hsu continues her career climbing after a small role in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and supporting role in Everything Everywhere All at Once to play opposite Lolo in the classic “she’s MY best friend, not yours” storyline. It’s also nice to hear her speak a bit more Mandarin than the broken attempts at it and Cantonese in EEAAO and her extremely limited Mandarin lines in American Born Chinese, though Shanghai-born Sherry’s Mandarin is arguably more “native” sounding than hers…
While the spine of the story follows the tried and tested winning formula of friends (though, technically they are not all friends to begin with) going on a fun trip together, then blaming each other when things go tits up, before an emotional reunion and wrap-up, the body of Joy Ride is so much more. With a heart and soul entrenched in the desire to discover each person’s truths and identities, this film explores what it means to be Asian in White-dominated and Asian-dominated societies where you’re seen as foreigners by some in both.
My only slight disappointment besides the film being much shorter than it could have been (though sometimes when one is not much more than 90 minutes this is not always a bad thing), is that Deadeye (the adorable Sabrina Wu)’s gender, sexuality and even whole character is far less delved into and told than the other three main leads. Their “acceptance” or declaration of their non-binary self is so subtle (the use of “she/her” pronouns by the others at the start to “they/them” at the end), while little else is known beyond their love of K-Pop culture and being Lolo’s friendless (except for online friends) cousin. This is in stark contrast to the sexually free Lola (hinted at being bisexual or pansexual) and Kat, and even the comparatively uptight Audrey, and their past and even jobs are more fleshed out.
Some might say the subtlety of Deadeye being non-binary doesn’t make it a big deal, emphasising the normality of it alongside the other three’s. However, my argument would be that for a film, especially one featuring an Asian cast about cultures that might not understand or appreciate such gender and sexual orientation diversity, the emphasis was sorely needed, especially when 3 out of 4 of the main cast do openly identify as part of the LGBTQ community.
That aside, Joy Ride is a filthy, funny and fabulous film that further retells relatable experiences of global ESEA (East and Southeast Asian) diaspora communities, from those who are adoptees and those who are second generation, non-Asian born, to those who fit the so-called Model Minority Myth and those who are the polar opposite of it. For many of us it hammers home the conflict we face of if we belong or not – whether that’s from how others and society have made us feel or how we simply feel inside (which is more than likely because others and society have made us feel that way).
And I urge not only ESEA and LGBTQ audiences to flock to the cinema to watch Joy Ride so they can see people and experiences like them represented on a truly human level (we can’t all fully relate to being from a crazy rich family or from a family of legendary martial artists), but everyone else too. There are so many moments others should be able to not only relate to but make them stop and think, “wait, this attitude isn’t right and needs changing” or on a positive note realise that Asians: are funny, can do more than melodramatic K-Dramas and martial arts epics, can be sexy and dirty, can poke fun at themselves, are not all high-flying lawyers, are not all the same, and above all can direct, write and star in hit wide-release films.
Rating: 👩🏻🦱👩🏻🦱👩🏻🦱👩🏻🦱 (4/5)
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