Jason LiMar 5

I really wanted to like this, but when I saw this at a film festival last year, I left the cinema feeling like I’d been slapped in the face. Friends and fellow Asians, you have been warned.

Mild spoilers in the thread below (see spoiler scale in the images!)

Show threadJason LiMar 5
Show threadJason LiMar 5
Show threadAlexia GaudeulMar 5
@jasonli it is maybe shocking for a white French-speaking kid to claim to be Japanese (wrong skin color?), but that is apparently what Amelie claimed as a kid. She went to a Japanese kindergarten and learned Japanese. Wrote a hilarious but probably, for some, offensive book about her experience in corporate Japan. Again, didn't see the movie, it probably doesn't introduce well the context and perspective. Orientalist, sure, but most Euro-Asian interactions are tinged with prejudice and ignorance
Show threadJason LiMar 5

@agaudeul interesting! The movie does not have her going to kindergarten (her house servant simply teaches her a few Japanese characters is all that’s shown). A kid saying strange things is not a big deal generally, but I read it in addition with everything else the movie was doing.

As for European interactions with Asians being tinged with prejudice and ignorance – exactly, and as an Asian person it’s a painful to see it celebrated on screen, and made into a big budget movie.

Show threadAlexia GaudeulMar 5
@jasonli yes, tough, the filmmakers should have been more careful. Paradoxically, btw, Amelie Nothomb is much liked in Japan where she is seen as an interesting oddity. Also, for reflection, there is another Amelie movie, Amelie Poulain, that uses all possible clichés about France, and was a big hit in Japan. Lots of Japanese come to Paris thinking it will be like the movie :P
Show threadJason Li
@agaudeul interesting. Didn’t realize her fame had made it back over to Japan. And aha! Yes, I have seen that movie many moons ago. A gorgeous cartoon of France ;)
Mar 5 at 6:04pmWeb