reactions to The Half Of It
This was an overall enjoyable film. Important preface: I am not a lesbian, so I won’t understand the importance and significance of normalizing a lesbian love story on screen.
Here are a few reactions I had to the film (spoilers).
- The tension between Aster and Ellie when Aster seemed to realize that Ellie has been writing the letters and texts the whole time (reacting to brush strokes on Aster’s painting) was beautifully portrayed. I loved the scene of going to Aster’s “secret spot” and that “will something happen” tension. The driving scene was beautifully shot and I got the sense that I could smell all the fresh air in the trees.
I really disliked the music choice though. There was no “best part” of that song. That song is awful. I guess the instrumental section of the song made it bearable.
When and why did Aster put on her shirt again? She started the scene by taking off her shirt. Was this an editing/sequence error?
2. I’ll have to check out Saving Face, Alice Wu’s first film, at some point. I have heard that’s a better film.
3. I don’t know who first described this film as a retelling of Cyrano de Bergerac (or of Roxanne). I think this film would be so much better if it’s not framed as a retelling of Cyrano, and hope Alice Wu hasn’t framed it that way. I haven’t seen Roxanne in its entirety, or read the play, but my understanding was that Cyrano, and Steve Martin’s character, C.D. Bales, had a comically large nose. What is Ellie Chu’s equivalent of a comically large nose? Her being Chinese? Yikes. I’d really love to hear Alice Wu talk about this and her intent, because the impact of this can be really dangerous.
4. The film makes so many references to white people being super awkward around Asian Americans, saying things like “hey it’s Paul’s Chinese friend” without explanation or discussing it. I’d be curious to hear why Alice Wu didn’t have any dialog addressing some of this. This, combined with what I discussed in 3, makes this film potentially harmful. Does Alice Wu have other signs of shame/self hate of being Asian? Did she just want to include it to set the scene of the…
