Thoughts on Shang Chi

The following is a repost of a movie review I wrote for the movie, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.

I didn’t know that I wanted a Marvel film that combined Jackie Chan inspired and wuxia-styled martial arts, but now that it is here, I love it.

What I Loved

The action! The action choreography was outstanding. Fights are frenetic and comprehensible. They are shot at angles and distances that give you a very good sense of the action.

Tony Leung! My goodness this man takes what could be a really boring and overdone role and elevates it. He really delivers and brings a gravitas and emotion to the movie that would have really suffered without him.

What I’m Mixed On

The story. On the positive side: the story pacing is brisk, the locales visually interesting, the emotional core (strengthened by Tony Leung’s performance) really keeps the story balanced and human. Character development is realistic and nuanced – rare for the genre and refreshing to see. On the negative side: There’s a bit more CG than I’d prefer. Although I love Simu Liu and Awkwafina, their acting performances oscillated between average to underwhelming at times.

What I’m Still Processing

I’m happy to see a big mainstream movie come out with asian leads. Representation matters. I remember growing up and not feeling like I fit in, disliking my hair, disliking asian food because it wasn’t like what people at school knew about, even disliking my given name. I heard film critic Walter Chaw say that when he was a kid, he wanted to (actually) look like Luke Skywalker - that he would have wanted to change everything about how he looked so that he could look like his childhood hero. I can relate to that. None of my childhood heroes looked anything like me. I can’t even imagine how my childhood would have been shaped differently, if there was an aspirational character with my legal name who looked like me.

That being said, when some of that big moment of representation includes asian stereotypes, it feels…I guess like two steps forward and one step back? What do I mean? Here are some things that stereotypically go together with Asians: secret knowledge of martial arts, ancient mystical history and lands, high academic aptitude, family honor. The movie does reckon with some of these stereotypes in passing - but also perpetuates some of them. Some of that is certainly not the movie’s fault and more likely an issue with the source material – but its there. Awkwafina and Simu’s characters both gesture towards being “average” asian americans, but then they immediately throw that averageness to the side in favor of typical asian tropes. Even to myself some of these ideas feel like nitpicks. And they probably are. I guess when you find yourself so infrequently represented in media, it’s hard not to project on to those rare times of representation all of the hopes and fears that each of us has experienced.

Even with these doubts, I’m still excited to one day sit down with my kids to watch Shang-Chi so they can see some people who look a little bit like them do badass things. That is still, a step forward.

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