Please be advised that the following post contains spoilers, including Q&A with the film’s writer and director, Lulu Wang. These spoilers address more ideas than specific content - and I have tried to limit them.
Last night I had the opportunity to see The Farewell, a film that has been on my radar for several months now. The opportunity was provided by the Asian Film Festival of Dallas, during a screening event featuring an appearance from writer and director Lulu Wang, herself. The experience came about fortuitously, in such a way that exemplifies one of the reasons that I so love film - it brings together all kinds of people, and has the great potential to tell the unifying stories of humanity. I had mentioned the film to a co-worker (who happens to be Chinese) some time ago and so she became aware of it and interested in it. She came across the title amongst a list of events in an email from an organization she had recently subscribed to, the AFFD. She had become aware of the AFFD by way of a friendly and observant employee (who happens to be white) at her library, where she frequently rents Asian films. The timing of these varied interactions between varied people lined up perfectly so that my co-worker and I were able to secure tickets. When we arrived at the theater, we saw several races and ages represented in the audience. We wondered how each of those folks had come to be aware of the event.
In the opening credits, Chinese characters (“letters”) precede English words, a little detail that seems to pay homage to Wang’s Chinese heritage. My Chinese co-worker translated the Chinese title for me: “Don’t Tell Her” - an interesting difference from the English title. I wonder if the notion of a farewell is more western than eastern.
The film begins with a series of little lies exchanged between Billi (Awkwafina) and Nai Nai in a phone conversation. During the conversation, we move from Billi’s New York surroundings to Nai Nai’s surroundings in China. This is the first of several such juxtapositions and parallels that occur visually in the film, each of which is done beautifully and with subtle intention. Many elements of the film are this way - subtle and beautiful: the long, closeup shots of character’s faces and profiles, the shapes and symmetry within the frames, the slow panning shots, the muted tones, and colored lights. Every detail of the cinematography works together to show and tell a simple story that zeros in on incredible tension and emotion.
One such element is the choice to cut from one scene to the next abruptly at times. The element is still subtle, but it is also jarring. Maybe this is how grief looks - you move from one thought or emotion to the next without warning. You don’t get to finish processing one emotion before being hit by the next. Of course, I may be reading way too much into that.
The film tells a very personal story about filmmaker, Lulu Wang’s family, yet more than manages to resonate with a universal audience. I can see myself in Billi in so many ways. I see it as I glimpse the painful experience of navigating her identity as an American with foreign roots. I see it as she struggles between perusing her lofty career goals and attempting to maintain her independence under the microscope of her parents’ opinions and concern. I see it her heart for her tightly-woven family. I see it in the weight of all the unspoken hurt she carries.
A lot of the impact of this film lies in the things that are unsaid. Moments of uncomfortable silence, as well as conversations that reveal previously unspoken thoughts and feelings drive the almost tangible tension and emotion. Even the film’s plot rests on what the family is not telling Nai Nai. That secret creates suspense which is only intensified by the quiet moments, the haunting and truly beautiful music from the soundtrack, and every element that prompts you to wonder about its symbolism. I found myself holding my breath, waiting for the moment when someone would reveal the secret to Nai Nai. Would it be a slip-up fueled by drunken sadness or an intentional reveal from a character motivated by their own convictions about the lie? Would Nai Nai be the one to reveal that she knew the whole time? What did all the birds and windows mean? How much should I read into the phrase “benign shadows”? I felt as though I was sharing in Billi’s distress, and still, I welcomed all the confusing feelings - I was all the more drawn to the story.
The members of the cast are more than believable - they come across very much like ordinary people, and like a real family. Each raw display of emotion, however grand or subtle is felt deeply by the audience. At times I simply did not know how to process the emotion. In one scene, Hao Hao, the groom in the marriage scheme that provides cover for the family to see Nai Nai, begins crying gently, and then uncontrollably during an operatic performance at his wedding reception. This moment is preceded by a drinking game, which Hao Hao, who says very little throughout the movie, is losing badly. After watching him take several shots during the festive game, it is not readily apparent that his tears are more than a response to the sad-sounding song. The moment goes on for some time and the conflicting urges to laugh and cry wrecked me inside.
In as much as the audience is made to wrestle our emotions, and our wrecked insides, the film does offer some comic relief as well. Some of the humor is like a more favorable version of deadpan humor - it is matter-of-fact humor, used to address serious concerns. At one point, a joke that I laughed at earlier in the film surfaced in an argument between Billi and her parents. “What were we supposed to tell you, that your grandmother is on the roof?”, her mother says, when Billi questions why her parents had not told her about her grandmother’s health yet. I felt personally attacked. Of course, other humorous elements are the subtleties of Awkwafina’s performance.
In fact, Awkwafina really shines in the film. Her ability to make us a laugh offers welcome comic relief, but the gravity that she brings to her performance in a very serious role is commendable, and representative of what the writer accomplishes in this film. Both the writing and the acting handle heavy themes like grief and death with a certain levity, and without diminishing the significance of these themes.
The film brings up a number of matters within the family which remain unresolved in the end. As a crying Nai Nai, is led away by her sister after a tearful goodbye, the audience is left to wonder whether she knows the truth about her health. When the screen faded to black after Billi’s return to New York shortly after, I felt a little betrayed. Would none of my questions be answered? Where was the resolution? What the hey, Lulu?!
In her Q&A after the film, Lulu Wang states that the catharsis and the resolution that we might seek is perhaps an American idea, and she had to resist that. “For me, the drama in this movie is the lack of drama, and so what [I’ve] come to realize is that the drama’s internal. [You’re] screaming on the inside, and on the outside . . . life goes on.” I suppose that is the story in a nutshell - the conflict between a family’s internal screams and their external attempts to go on with life, in light of the emotional burden they are carrying for Nai Nai.
For more about the film and the writer, listen to the brief Q&A session below.