Ping Pong Playa

I've meaning to blog about this for sometime now. The 26th Annual San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival came happened at the end of March. I decided to go and support the fest and chose Ping Pong Playa as my study break on Saturday in San Jose. I dragged D and two friends, O and K, along to see the film.

WARNING - SPOILERS BELOW

I am happy to report that I chose well this year. In the past, I've chosen some really hard to watch and awkward films to go see. In general, I don't have a very good track record of choosing good movies to see anyway. B, one of my closest friends from high school always reminds me how I chose for us to go see "My Blue Heaven" on a day we decided to ditch school. What a waste of time that was! I think I also chose other wretched films like "Must Love Dogs" (though I have to admit that I am a John Cusack fan).

So the film Ping Pong Playa was hilarious. I don't think I've laughed that hard at a film in a long time. The entire audience laughed as loudly as I did (except for the old white guy at the end of my row- he laughed the loudest - which makes me wonder what the hell he was laughing at). At some points I was laughing so hard, I teared a bit and had to take a couple of deep breaths to calm down.

The film is such an interesting mix of racial politics, class and gender issues. The storyline is familiar but not really. You have the familiar tropes: torn between two cultures- "American" and "Chinese"; loser guy wants to get with cute girl; underdog with unrealized potential that finds a reason to realize his potential; kids as sidekicks provide comedy relief; cultural miscommunication between English speakers and "native" speakers; and the black sheep child redeeming the good name of the family. There are interesting twists with the main character C-Dub, whose best friend is Black and trying to learn Chinese. C-Dub is an outspoken "Asian American" whose call-outs of racism play on the idea of using the "race card." The love interest turns out to be a smart Asian American studies grad student who cheers for C-Dub. They never get together in the end but the potential is definitely there. The "good" and filial brother played by the always fun to watch Roger Fan, displays loser tendencies of his own by being the perfect child, hitting on Miss Chinatown (and getting denied), and wearing bland Gap outfits. C-Dub is himself an imperfect hero- his hyper-active mouth talks with popular slang described by his parents as "sounding black," he refuses to speak in Chinese when spoken to in Chinese, is unable to hold down a steady job and spends his days daydreaming about the next big money-making business while spending the rest of the time playing video games in his room at his parent's house. He rides his best friend's, JP Money, played by the irresistable funny Khary Peyton (how did he manage to keep a straight face in half of those scenes???), kid-size motor bike around town and is never once self-deprecating about the "loserness" of it all.

All the characters just seemed genuine and real, as if my students could identify with any of them. The only exception to this sentiment is that the main "villains" gave off an overtly stereotypical "homosexual" feel, which I think the actors tried to balance but at times couldn't pull off. So the slight homophobic feel to the main characters (why did the one of the bad guys have to be gay?) was the only problematic part of this film. However I am not willing to write off the film because the story it tells does a lot to bring into the foreground the difficult lives of young Asian Americans growing up in a highly complex world. (I have a soft spot for films about Asian American youth like this one and Better Luck Tomorrow.)

On the whole, the soundtrack was also really great. I think the writers Jessica Yu and Jimmy Tsai and whoever coordinated their music did a great job by recruiting Jin tha MC and Chops from Mountain Brothers fame to contribute songs.

I checked the website and unfortunately it looks like the film is making the festival rounds right now. D wondered when it was going to come out on DVD because he thought his family would get a kick out of the film. I definitely think there can be a mainstream audience for this film. After all, if you're going to go see a film about ping pong, why bother with the crappy alternative?