Full disclosure: I knew I was going to like the movie before I watched it. From the former lawyer, restaurateur, author, outspoken media personality, and now filmmaker, Boogie is the directorial debut of Eddie Huang. Led by performances by Taylor Takahashi and Taylour Paige, the film also features a bittersweet, first and final supporting acting role by Bashar “Pop Smoke” Jackson. Eddie’s works and opinionated takes on the immigrant experience have been an ever present inspiration for myself, Logging On’s usual writer in-charge Ian, and by extension ICYT’s own unique brand of community building through fashion, art, music, food, and essentially immigrant storytelling. When I first watched the trailer for Boogie, I was presented with a coming of age story that used basketball and the multiculturalism of New York City as a framework to explore the Asian-American immigrant experience. As a child born of the asian immigrant diaspora, a former basketball athlete (though admittedly far from being as gifted as the titular character), and lastly also one who found meaning within the intersections of Asian and Black culture - I immediately saw parts of myself in this film. I got emotional (re: cried) watching this film, not because of the plot (more on that later) but because I never thought I’d see such niche, specific aspects of my life represented in popular media as seen in Boogie. So instead of offering a straightforward review and designating some semantic score or rating, I’d rather try and articulate my own explanation on the cultural relevance of a story like Boogie. From the subversion of asian male stereotypes, a poignant display of intergenerational trauma, Black culture providing a reference point for culture for other ethnic communities, and a nuanced take on diversity without the need to explain it for the white viewer. Boogie has a lot to say, and in a lot of ways speaks for many in the Asian community, myself included.
In one of the first scenes of the movie, our main character Alfred, or to his family Xiao Ming, or as he and his friends refer to him Boogie, jokingly refers to NBA player and widely notable Asian-american Jeremy Lin a “model minority Jesus freak.” Shortly after, he tries to haphazardly approach and garner the interest of his love interest, Eleanor who then promptly rejects him. This scene encapsulates the strengths of Boogie: it is far from afraid to subvert the stereotypes of the asian american experience, specifically that of the East-Asian cisgender/heterosexual male, while also strategically leaning on conventional genre/plot tropes to communicate a relatable experience. Our lead Boogie speaks his mind, at times is quick to temper, shows sexual attraction and is positioned as desirable, and frankly is a bit of a dick in the same way most 17 year olds in highschool can be. All of these attributes play against type of the stereotypical asian male: the stoic sage or nerd character who is often asexual and meek - a mirror to the “submissive” archetype that dangerously hangs over Asian women. These contemporary traits are contrasted sharply by his traditional, deeply rooted respect and pride in his Chinese culture. Not only is this seen in the immigrational pressures he feels from his parents and ancestors, but also in the small gestures of repeatedly pouring tea for those older than him. Since I saw so much of myself in the character going into the movie, I couldn’t help but also laugh at myself when I felt frustration as the result of the abrasiveness of his temper and teenage, self-existential angst. At the same time, I also couldn’t help but recall how conflicted I felt the time I was on a date and a white girl told me “I was really cool for an Asian guy.” As a character, Alfred/Xiao Ming/Boogie is aware of the racialized constructs that impact his life and actively fights against them, but they don’t fully define who he is. And that is a sentiment any immigrant can deeply relate to.
In a dramatic high point of the plot, Boogie’s mother who is portrayed as cold and controlling, slaps Boogie for coming to the defence of his father. Having his own reckless streak, his father is prone to anger fuelled outbursts that have landed him in jail in the past. Though the dynamic is dramatized as a broken home for the sake of plot, in my own opinion this scene is one of the best portrayals of modern Asian-immigrant family households in popular media today. This is because it succinctly illustrates the critical meeting points of the intergenerational effects of immigration: Boogie’s mom isn’t cold and angry because she doesn’t love him or his father, furthermore his Father’s reckless behaviour isn’t because he is an evil person. These problematic, and to an extent abusive, behaviour patterns stem from their own unprocessed immigrational trauma of having to survive and build a life for themselves, that have now calloused into what we see on screen. Smartly framed by Eddie Huang around the all too familiar setting of the family dinner table. Opposite to this, is Boogie’s plight as an American born Asian-American: he is constantly faced with the cultural pressures of his parents moving to a foreign land in pursuit of a better life, and not only having to do right by them, but also the generations who came before them that helped make it happen. On top of that, he faces the discrimination of chasing his dream of being an Asian basketball player. As he explains to Eleanor one night, he has “5000 years of Chinese history” bearing down on him with every move he plays on the court. In a way, just hearing this line said out loud was a cathartic experience, simultaneously validating and releasing the centuries of my own pressures immigration and colonialism has put on my own back.
This “Survival vs. Self-Actualization” dichotomy is what underlines that scene between Boogie and his mother. For me, one of my “slap moment” came when I told my parents I wanted to pursue a career in fashion years ago. Another “slap moment” came most recently when I told them I was going to do creative work full time. Even outside of my own professional life, I’ve often discussed with fellow Asian friends and peers on the staggering pressures we often feel, but also how difficult it is for our parents to show affection. I can probably count the amount of times I’ve hugged my parents between two hands. They’ve never apologized to me without quietly presenting me a plate of cut fruit. Not because those feelings don’t exist, but because the generation before us lack the communication skills to do so. That generational disconnect is what underlines the slap between Boogie and his mother, and why many children of immigrants, Asian heritage or otherwise, countlessly face their own “slap moments.”
For context of my own personal history, my parents immigrated from the Philippines to eventually land in a predominantly white upper-middle class suburb in St. Albert, where they worked very hard to create a fruitful life for our family. Having reflected on this later in life and explicitly asking them, I know it was hard for them to see their kids come home from school with stories of being called “chink” among other names, and having trouble fitting in with the other white kids. I still remember telling my parents the stories of teachers mixing up me and the one other Filipino guy that was in my grade. Or the time a bully asked me “what McDonald’s my parents work at?” to the laughs of my classmates around me. It wasn’t until I found basketball through my cousins in the more ethnically diverse Northside of Edmonton, and by extension Hip-Hop, streetwear, and “urban” re: Black culture in general, which offered me a way to reframe my surroundings. To ultimately discover that I didn’t have to fit in, or seek the approval of the white kids that picked on me in school.
Before he debuted as a filmmaker, Eddie had “Huang’s World” - his travel show on VICE which took a Bourdain-esque approach of using food as a device to explore the similarities between immigrant cultures. In his episode in Japan, he spoke with a Black barber from the US who found personal freedom and expression in the Japanese regimented ethos. In the very same episode, Eddie says that Black culture - whether it be through sports, music, fashion, etc. was instrumental in his own journey of navigating his own cultural identity. Though he obviously was not Black, it was Black culture which gave him the necessary framework to build his own worldview. In a society that sees everything in a binary, and quite literally views the world as Black or White, Asians (even more so or South-East Asians and Pacific Islanders) are still fighting to be part of the discussion. I viscerally remember the sheer confusion one caucausian classmate of mine had in junior high, as I was probably the first Filipino person he interacted with that was presented as an “equal” to him in terms of power dynamics. As I arrived in class with slanted eyes, olive/yellow hued, brown skin and coarse wavy hair, I was promptly greeted with “Hey you, are you Chinese or Black?” I knew I wasn’t Chinese, and I for damn sure wasn’t white, but because at the time I was obsessed with AND-1 streetball, baggy Ecko jeans and R&B, Black culture was the closest semblance of a reference point for a world that wanted to strictly categorize me. For Eddie Huang and myself, existing adjacent to Black culture came from having little interest or ability to relate to the white narratives around us. And Boogie is no exception, tastefully showcasing a vision of post-immigrational multiculturalism I can’t hope but to aspire for within our own communities.
In the film, the Chinese Boogie’s best friend and teammate Richie is Domincan. His girlfriend Eleanor is Trinidadian. Pop Smoke’s antagonist character Monk, is African-American. The dialogue of the plot expertly code switches from subtitled Mandarin, to millennial urban slang, set to a drill rap soundtrack which features the likes of Fivio Foreign, and the ever-magnetic Pop Smoke. The story of Boogie is respectfully self-aware that it exists adjacent to Black culture, especially within the conventions of basketball and rap music. While also being ethnically diverse, without feeling a need to overly explain itself to a white audience. In fact, it’s not remotely interested in relating to a white audience. In Jessica Kiang’s review for Rolling Stone, she tactfully notes that aside from the marginal characters of Boogie’s basketball coach and english teacher, there aren’t any white characters in the film. Run that back and say it again: there are no white characters in this film. It doesn’t need to explain itself to the white viewer. There’s no shoe-horned explanation to the visual of Boogie and his friends playing dominoes in the park, or the subtlety intimate scenes of him and Eleanor eating dumplings at Chinese restaurants - it just is. This is what contemporary multiculturalism looks like. And frankly, I can’t help but see the parallels between this specific vision of diversity and the community ICYT seeks to promote.
My final point on Boogie is that as a film, is that it is far from perfect. The pacing feels rushed, character arcs are relatively straight-forward, and the cast all decidedly look like they’re in their 30’s while playing highschoolers. Hell, just from a story standpoint I wasn’t the biggest fan of the ending. That being said, I think it knows this, and isn’t trying to be perfect. The film knows that by using the well known tropes that come with a coming of age and underdog sports plots we all love, these genre conventions serve as an entry point for the larger cultural discussions it hopes we can have. In her best scene in the movie, Eleanor responds to Boogie’s “5000 years of Chinese history” line by reminding him that while he may feel the overbearing weight of his ancestry, hers was erased almost all together because of slavery and colonialism. Though clearly not identical in experience, this line serves as Eddie Huang’s message to the viewer: as children of the immigrant diaspora, we are often more similar than different, and are all trying to navigate and define our own identity in a world that wasn’t built for us to succeed.
The universal truth in Boogie is that it doesn’t have all the answers, but the few it does possess ring true: a subversive take on the Asian-American male, a succinct portrayal of the nuances post immigration intergenerational traumas, what contemporary multiculturalism should be, and how Black culture often serves as the primary counter-culture reference point for many minorities. This film was never going for cinematic genre-pushing, or let alone try and solve racism outright. Though it is a few very great and important steps forward for the latter. And as for all of my own pressures and considerations of cultural identity and experience, just like for Xiao Ming/Alfred/Boogie: simply by existing as myself and living by my own truths to the best of my abilities, I am already doing my part in moving progress forward. And that’s more than enough for me and my ancestors.
