Review of Didi / 弟弟, directed by Sean Wang

If you’re new here, and stumbled upon this blog through the mythical powers of the Internet, welcome! I know a lot of visitors to my website are people who randomly come upon this website through search engines like Google, but I also do have a lot of visitors who come back. Regardless: my name is Ashley, and I started this blog in order to keep track of everything I’m coming across in the world.

I recently fell into a spell of unemployment probably during the worst time to be unemployed, as it was very hard to find a job. I was applying to hundreds of jobs, getting interviews, but no offer was manifesting for me in the near future. So during this time, I had a lot of free time, and spent a good chunk of it chipping away at the blog.

Once upon a time I used to go the movies every week, as I had an AMC A List subscription. For my non-Americans out there reading this, this means that a local movie theater chain here in the States has a subscription where if you pay like $28 a month, you can watch up to four movies a week there. I ended up losing my car in April 2024, which is when I stopped going as often.

I also used to work as a film critic, so screeners were getting sent to me. Twisters was one of the movies that was sent to me a while back, but I never got around to it because I wasn’t doing the specific coverage for it and I had decided I wanted to leave that job to pursue something else, which was a decision partially motivated because I liked blogging for myself more.

Anyways, during my period of unemployment mentioned above, I would go to the library a lot to search for movies. I often borrow my sister’s DVD player to watch movies from there, and I love seeing what my library can get ahold of. Usually all the new and hip movies appear there after a set amount of time, which is great for me and my budget.

It was at my library where I found a copy of Didi, which I’ve been meaning to watch, but never found on streaming platforms. When I saw it sitting there, I knew it was time to finally watch the film.

Let’s get into the review!

A Taiwanese American boy grapples with his coming of age story and changing life circumstances.

Our main character in this movie is Chris Wang, who, as of 2008 (when the film is set), is 13. He lives in Fremont, California, with his mother, older sister, and grandmother (Nai Nai). His father left the family to go back to Taiwan and earn more, sending his income back to them while he lives his life elsewhere.

Chris’s older sister is also preparing to move out, as she has been accepted into UC San Diego on the other side of the state. There’s quite a bit of friction between the two of them, and they often fight when they’re home together, with Chris even pulling some gross pranks on her throughout the movie.

Meanwhile, at school, Chris has his group of friends (Farhad and Soup), who he makes YouTube videos with. None of them are really popular, and the videos they make aren’t exactly adult-like, as they feature quite a bit of humor that could be classified as “teen boy humor.”

Chris has a crush on a half-Asian girl at their school named Madi, and using AIM/Facebook, he starts talking to her online. He has a bit of a complex about himself, and I would even describe him as a bit self-destructive at times with how he engages with himself and others.

Madi and Chris go out on a date after skirting by each other awkwardly, with some longing awkward glances occuring, and Chris realizes that she has some internalized racism against Asians based on some of the comments she makes, including one where she says Chris is pretty attractive for an Asian.

It’s when she tries to initiate something sexual with him that he backs off and flees, blocking her on social media platforms. At the same time, his relationship with Farhad is falling apart after Chris makes a terrible comment against women in front of Farhard’s crush then describes how they tortured a dead squirrel.

Farhad then stops talking to Chris and removes him from his top friends on MySpace, leaving Chris really upset because that was his best friend. This sucks Chris into a friend group with a bunch of older skaters he admires, as he helps them with their videography. However, he lies to them by saying he’s half-Asian.

When Chris starts noticing his mother is having a lot of problems with his Nai Nai and the pressure from others (they go to a dinner with another mom who brags about her son going to UCLA). Nai Nai also keeps nagging her in unproductive ways, and Chris overhears when his mother threatens to send her to Taiwan.

The skaters take Chris to a party with booze and weed, and his sister covers for him. But when the skaters realize Chris’s videography skills are terrible and he lied about being half-Asian, Chris goes off on his mother. The skaters are appalled and leave Chris behind, and when he’s at cram school, he hits an arrogant kid there and is about to get kicked out.

Chris runs away when his mother says she might have had a better future if she never had her kids, but when he comes home, his mother tells him about how his sister ran away once too. She admits her kids were her dream. At school, when it starts again, Chris approaches Madi, but she cooly tells him that the boy he beat up in cram school was her friend.

Chris decides to join the art club, and Farhad and he are mending their relationship. The film ends with his mother picking him up from school and Chris describing his day to his mother.

Overall Thoughts

As I was watching this movie, I realized I had never watched a movie (or as far as I can recall) about an Asian-American boy’s coming-of-age. I had seen one at Tribeca years prior about a Korean-American girl and her coming of age story, but never from a boy’s perspective.

This is a special movie and I think it shows a specific moment of time at a specific place with such a tender, intimate heart. This feels so personal, and even the way the characters are framed and blocked feels very intentional and careful. Chris feels and looks so small in some scenes, which makes you want to hug this poor kid despite his mistakes.

Beyond the significance of the story and its representation, I think this is a critical movie that will be considered a classic. What we do and don’t call a classic is politically charged in itself, so you can take that statement lightly in some ways, but this was such a solid movie technically and artistically.

Go see it if you haven’t already. Movies are meant to be watched, not read about on the Internet.

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