중국계 미국인 영화에 대한 일 고찰 ― 영화 <크레이지 리치 아시안>과 <페어웰>을 중심으로

Abstract

Both The Crazy Rich Asian and The Farewell are films about the establishment of the next generation immigrants’ life and identity, produced based on Chinese-American directors’ autobiographical experiences. Jon Chu and Lulu Wang observed the form of life, immigration, from an indifferent and somewhat light perspective, by escaping from the narrative of immigration, including their blind nostalgia toward the homelands, resentment against other countries and inferiority felt by immigrants, which have been embodied by the previous Chinese-American films. Moreover, both films contain the emotion of alienation derived from the situation in which they could not be absorbed in nowhere, though they do not strongly exhibit any critical awareness. It is the family that rescues characters from such a bridle of alienation. They could grow by overcoming their wandering between both cultures of their homelands and other countries, because they were cared for by their families. Although these films contain the narrative about the next immigration generation, a limited and specific theme, they could invoke empathy from many types of audiences across places and generations, since they pursued the general narrative with stories about families. In addition, they suggested how human beings can identify their existence and dignity, in the contemporary cultural circumstance in which the global Diaspora is massively produced, by resolving conflicts and problems within groups and establishing multi-identity, via the transposition of characters’ identity.