With the coronavirus rescheduling all the premieres and launches of Hollywood products, it looks like Asian March which initially had five Asian or Asian American projects debut on television or the theaters, has extended into May for an Asian Spring.
Netflix is now offering three promising AAPI projects, one of which is streaming right now, two that will premiere May 1, kicking off Asian Pacific American Heritage Month.
The big change was Disney delaying the general release of the live-action Mulan to later this summer. With the shelter-in-place mandates in the US and China, the blockbuster with an international cast of Asians and Asian Americans, would have failed miserably if it opened on the original March date.
Tigertail, streaming on Netflix
The big premiere in April was Tigertail, which opened April 7. Alan Yang’s tale of immigration is loosely based on his father’s journey to the US. The movie is just over an hour and a half and I wish it could have gone on for at least another hour to flesh out subtleties Yang offered in the stunningly beautiful film. It stars Tzi Ma and Christine Ko.
Much like the Chinese or Japanese scrolls depicting landscapes surrounded by empty space, a lot of Tigertail’s power lies in those empty spaces, the closeup of the father’s face as he seeks to force his facial muscles to tighten in order to hide the emotions he dares not reveal, the silences between father and daughter that speaks volumes about the lifetime of tension between them.
This allows the viewer to fill in the spaces with their own experiences and emotions. Perhaps this is why the film has had mixed reviews: Asian reviewers almost universally love the film, but White reviewers just see emptiness.
Hollywood, May 1, Netflix
After sweeping the awards shows for his portrayal of serial killer Andrew Cunanan, Darren Criss is back in a star-studded Netflix miniseries, Hollywood.
In his newest venture, like he did in The Assassination of Gianni Versace, Criss will once again play a multi-racial Filipino American, movie director Raymond Ainsley.
If the number of Hollywood luminaries taking bit parts, cameos and the extended trailer is any indication, this could be mean more awards for the Filipino American actor.
It’s an alternate history of old Hollywood with all the glamor associated with Hollywood’s so-called Golden Age during the 1940’s-1950’s.
Hollywood will follow a group of aspiring actors and filmmakers in post-World War II Hollywood as they try to make it in Tinseltown — no matter the cost. Each character offers a unique glimpse behind the gilded curtain of Hollywood’s Golden Age, spotlighting the unfair systems and biases across race, gender and sexuality that continue to this day. Provocative and incisive, Hollywood exposes and examines decades-old power dynamics, and what the entertainment landscape might look like if they had been dismantled.
A whole lot of cameos will be making appearances, including movidom’s legendary Anna May Wong, played by Michelle Krusiec.
Receiving less press but perhaps more accessible to the non-Asian audience is the romcom The Half of It and Mindy Kaling’s coming-of-age series Never Have I Ever.
Never Have I Ever, May 1, Netflix
Never Have I Ever is an upcoming Netflix Original coming-of-age comedy series co-created and written by Mindy Kaling and Lang Fisher based on Kaling’s youth in Massachusetts. After a nationwide casting call, newcomer Maitreyi Ramakrishnan was picked to play the lead.
This will be the first Netflix Original series produced by Kaling, who has previously worked as a writer and executive producer on The Office, and Fisher who has served as a writer on award-winning shows such as 30 Rock, The Mindy Project and Brooklyn Nine-Nine.
The Half of It, Netflix, May 1
The Half of It is a movie that will begin streaming on May 1 to kick off Asian Pacific American Heritage Month.
The feature flick is like a Cyrano de Bergerac situation with a modern-day twist. If To All the Boys I Ever Loved, a Netflix hit that was part of 2018’s Asian August, was a teen romance fantasy, The Half of It presents a situation closer to the confusing, questioning reality faced by most Asian American teenagers.
Leah Louis plays Ellie Chu, a friendless and shy straight-A student who runs a business in school, making money off the students who want her to do their homework. She receives an unusual request from one of the jocks, Paul, to help him write a letter to Aster Flores, the girl he loves. The unlikely pair strike up a friendship, but it becomes extremely complicated when Ellie finds herself falling for Aster too.
Ghost in A Shell 2045, streaming on Netflix
Scarlett Johansson will not be in this latest iteration of the Ghost in A Shell. For the uninitiated, Ghost in the Shell is a long-running anime franchise that began its life as a cyberpunk manga in 1989, following a cyborg named Major Motoko Kusanagi who worked in a counter-cyberterrorist organization called Public Security Section 9. Notoriously, Paramount’s live-action adaptation of the story sparked controversy over the casting of Johansson as Major Motoko Kusanagi, clearly a Japanese character in the animated story. Hopefully, this new story will be just the thing for fans to put that recent film firmly in the dustbin of awful mistakes.
To call Netflix’s visual take on Ghost in the Shell different would be an understatement. The animated series has gotten a full makeover in the form of CGI that looks more suited to a Pixar film or a video game; it’s a beautiful, albeit drastic, change from the drawn animation most fans have come to know. In the first full trailer for Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045, which is set to arrive this April, Netflix offers a full look at the cast, from Major to Batou.
Asian Americans, PBS, May 11 & 12
On May 11 & May 12, 2020 PBS will premiere Asian Americans, a five-hour film series that will chronicle the contributions, and challenges of Asian Americans, the fastest-growing ethnic group in America. Personal histories and new academic research will cast a fresh lens on US history and the role Asian Americans have played in it.
Led by a team of Asian American filmmakers, including Academy Award®-nominated series producer Renee Tajima-Peña (Who Killed Vincent Chin?, No Más Bebés), Asian Americans examines the significant role of Asian Americans in shaping American history and identity, from the first wave of Asian immigrants in the 1850s and identity politics during the social and cultural turmoil of the 20th century to modern refugee crises in a globally connected world.
“These are American stories: stories of resilience in the face of racism, of overcoming challenges as refugees from war and strife, of making contributions in all sectors of society: business, technology, military service, and the arts,” said Stephen Gong, Executive Director of the Center for Asian American Media.
Unladylike 2020, PBS, May 13
This series tells the stories of little known women who have had a big impact on the US. On May 13, the 1-hour epsode is about Tye Leung Schulze (1887–1972), the youngest daughter of low-income immigrants from China, escaped from domestic servitude at age nine and an arranged marriage at age 12. She began her career translating for victims of human trafficking in San Francisco’s Chinatown working for Donaldina Cameron’s Presbyterian Mission Home. In 1910, she became the first Chinese American woman to work for the federal government, as assistant matron and an interpreter at the Angel Island Immigration Station, a detention center designed to control the flow of Asian immigrants into the US under the Chinese Exclusion Act. While there, she fell in love with a White immigration inspector, Charles Schulze, and married him against both their parents’ wishes and California’s anti-miscegenation laws. In 1912, one year after California granted women the right to vote, Leung became the first Chinese American woman to vote in a US election.
Burden of Truth, CW, May 21
Kristin Kreuk is back with her series, Burden of Truth, on the CW network. The series centers on attorney Joanna Hanley (Kreuk), who walked away from her partnership at a corporate law firm in order to figure out why a mysterious illness was afflicting high school girls in her home town of Millwood, Manitoba. By the end of season one, Joanna was estranged from her dad and changed her last name to Chang — her mother’s maiden name. In season two, she has joined a Winnipeg firm, where a new client involves her in a case full of political and cyber intrigue.
PLUS …
With Asian American film festivals cancelled around the country due to the coronavirus crisis, communities will depend more on programs on television and online to observe Asian Pacific American Heritage Month in May.
Local PBS-affiliated television stations, such as:
have their own individual programming for Asian Pacific American Heritage Month. Check you local listings for more information.
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