Eat a Bowl of Tea

Amazon.com

Director Wayne Wang is in his appealingly low-key groove with this wry comedy-drama, a precursor to his later success with The Joy Luck Club. It's set in the aftermath of World War II, when the restrictive U.S. immigration laws had finally been relaxed. WWII vet Russell Wong is a young Chinese-American hepcat, strong-armed by his dad (the wonderfully gnarled character actor Victor Wong) into an arranged marriage with a Chinese girl (Cora Miao). The trip to China, and the atmosphere of New York's Chinatown, are neatly mounted. The film's central joke, and metaphor, is the bridegroom's impotence after marriage; he's cowed by the expectations of his traditional culture, which don't necessarily match his own ideas. In its quiet way, Eat a Bowl of Tea examines the larger issues of ethnic identity while poking affectionate fun at its floundering characters--a distinctly modern attitude for a 1940s story. --Robert Horton

Customer Reviews:

I wouldn't eat (or drink) this Tea again! .......2007-08-12

The title of this film alludes to a remedy prescribed to one of the characters. If I was to be more specific and explain what the remedy is for I would ruin the plot, so, I won't do that! I will tell you, since I take writing these capsule reviews very seriously that I don't believe that this film is worthy of your time. Based on a novel by Luis Chu, EAT A BOWL OF TEA examines 1940s United States and the Chinese-American experience in this country. Due to a stringent immigration act, all Chinese men coming abroad the USA to seek work were forced to leave their wives behind. Chinese women were not allowed to accompany their husbands, when they came seeking jobs to support their families back home. Thus, the older Chinese men who had settled in this country twenty years before, were aging alone, without the possiblity of bringing first born sons into the world, to continue their familial lineage. In spite of miscygenation laws, Chinese and Chinese-American men would sometimes keep company with Caucasian women, as is depicted in the example of the young main character, Ben Loy (Russell Wong). Ben is sent home to China, by his father, to meet and marry a nice Chinese girl. When he finds her (Cora Miao) and they get married, Loy becomes impotent (one factor possibly being stress--especially, the stress of producing an heir--something that is mandatory in the eyes of Ben's father, as well as their community). This leads to unfortunate circumstances and choices based on frustration and embarrassment.

Why didn't this film work for me? Well, for starters, themes of family obligation, extramarital affairs, and bicultural identity were handled in a very clumsy way and the poor acting certainly didn't help. Russell Wong's delivery of the lines was wooden (at best) and the other characters seemed more like poorly-developed caricatures. What's more, a seduction scene that should have been sexy was more creepy. In fact, more than one of us watching this scene thought that it almost came off more as a rape scene, which was incredibly disturbing. Skip this one.

Poorly Played.......2007-02-21

I had to watch this movie for a class, and I was sorely disappointed. You don't need to have read the book to see how abridged the movie is, condensing long periods of time into a few unconvincing seconds. This isn't helped by the fact that Russell Wong has the emotional range of Keanu Reeves. There were only two scenes in the film that I thought came together in every respect - both starring Victor Wong - but the fact that they were such good moments only made the poor quality of the rest of the film that much more apparent.

I felt the script was bland and unoriginal, and the actors seemed to lack any real personality on the screen because of this. It seemed exactly like a dozen other American movies, only this one starred Chinese actors. None of the decisions within the movie seem believable, and the ending feels tacky and schmaltzy and all those other things I can't stand in a movie.

It's definitely not the worst movie, but I had much higher expectations from it.

An original and poignant story.......2005-10-10

This film deserves a special place in the Chinese-American pantheon. It's not about the "clash" between old and new, East and West, a theme that too many movies and books have beaten to death. It's about family, love, relationships, and history, without any cliches. The story touches on subjects very rarely dealt with, such as impotence, brilliantly so. The love story is romantic and realistic. Everyone puts in wonderfully authentic performances. This is my favorite Chinese-American film. If you like it, you may want to read the book, which is even better.

Excellent movie.......2005-09-25

This movie provides audience with the discussing topic for cultural conflicts and interference. It reveals how a Chinese women immigrate to America on the basis of marriage, and how she represents the so-called Chinese virtue to masculism society in teh early time.

more emasculation of Asian-American men.......2002-10-19

This film is important and needed for three reasons. One, you get to see supa-fine Russell Wong. Two, rarely do you see a movie with so many Asian-American men. Three, this movie illustrates that Asians did live in the US before 1965's liberalization of immigration laws. Still, in this movie, when Russell is a gigolo for a white female client, he's sexually active. However, when he has a cute Chinese wife, he's impotent. This seems like some disturbing white-worshipping to me. It's kinda anti-Asian woman too. Haven't we seen and heard enough of historical stereotypes of Asian men as not true masculines?! Then, the end is too fast and illogical. This movie had so much potential that it did not meet.

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