I think most people now realize that the American Dream is a myth. The only folks who seem to seriously believe in it now are hard right-wing ideologues who buy every trope of infallible Americana, too fractured from reality in a myriad of other ways that this one aspect of it is dwarfed by comparison. It is an alluring fantasy though, that everyone with enough determination and hard work can accomplish anything, go anywhere, and find success. It certainly has proven a great advertising hook for immigrants in search of a new or better life. And yet even though what they’re following is a lie, there is something noble in stories of those who attempt to attain it. Maybe it’s because their intentions are so pure, because they’re willing to sacrifice so much for the future of themselves and their family, because they haven’t been worn down yet by the reality and still have hope, and because they actually put in the effort that the beneficiaries of the ‘American Dream’ never have.
Whatever it is, it’s the reason that Lee Isaac Chung’s Minari, one of the greatest films about chasing the American Dream, is so captivating. There’s a defiant earnestness to the ambitions of Jacob Yi (Steven Yeun) to cultivate a successful farm in middle-of-nowhere Arkansas, to provide for his family, and to prove to himself the worth of the risks taken to get him here. He’s unrelenting and terribly stubborn in this, but through the eyes of his young son David (Alan Kim), we see likewise a model of conviction and resilience, and the futility of yearning for the promised rewards of American capitalism.
Davids’ is the point-of-view the movie is largely told through, which shouldn’t be a surprise. The film is heavily autobiographical to Chungs’ own childhood as a Korean-American kid in the 1980s on a farm in the rural south. It’s dotted with details and episodes that are too strikingly specific not to have been based in personal memory, and that do well to colour the film and keep the Yis from being mere avatars of the Asian immigrant experience. Chung in fact does everything he can to flesh them out and keep their Korean identity from being their chief character. And yet that Korean identity is still vitally important.
This is a family that eats Korean and speaks Korean at home, which is to say through most of the film. The bizarre and racist rubric by which Minari is considered a “foreign film” by awards associations is just another expression of its realism to the home life of many immigrant families in dominant English-speaking countries. It’s completely natural for instance the way that the Yis shift between languages in their communication with each other, exactly as anyone who’s spent time with immigrant families has observed. They exist within two cultures, and Chung illustrates that duality impeccably with the presence of Grandma Soon-ja (Youn Yuh-jung) who comes to live with them and whose relationship with David becomes a source of conflict, as she doesn’t meet the boys’ American standards of grandmotherhood. It becomes unnecessarily antagonistic on Davids’ part, the things he says and does to her, a sweet and genial if coarse and hard-edged elderly woman. She’s the one who most believes in his toughness and durability, in spite of a debilitating heart condition he’s had since birth. Youn has been a respected actress in Korea for decades and gives the brusque Soon-ja an extremely charming liveliness that transcends any ethnic or language barriers. And for his part, the young Kim does a fine job too –if you don’t always understand his attitude, you can relate to his anxieties and curiosity.
Steven Yeun though, who has been steadily becoming one of the most exceptional new talents in movies over the past few years, is the reserved soul of Minari. Emotionally distant and single-minded though he may be, Jacob is the most compelling character, and a lot of it is down to the subtle choices Yeun makes. His body language when attending church for example, or around an eccentric neighbour played by Will Patton, speaks to his discomfort in white spaces, while at home he exerts the utmost authority. Keeping them in check under a stone-faced determinism, Yeun nonetheless demonstrates the passion and disappointment Jacob often is forced to deal with, and even the hurt at what it’s putting his family through. Chung perceives this both from the vantage point of David and his sister Anne (Noel Kate Cho), and the parents themselves. Han Yi-ri is a perfect partner for Yeun, and her performance here is a revelation, as her Monica bears most of the emotional strain of Jacobs’ choices. At times, their relationship is extremely trying, they have intense arguments, but Han conveys with equal depth that silent connection and understanding she maintains with Jacob, and he with her. The frustration of both is eminently palpable as you see the stagnation of their life and the allusions to why it must be so. Just as many immigrants are afforded jobs they are grossly overqualified for to get by, Jacob who had been a farmer in Korea, in America must start at the bottom -both he and Monica paying the bills by sexing chicks at a hatchery until the farm can turn a profit.
Between these scenes of family strife and adjustment though is a lot of beautiful filmmaking: quiet, graceful moments evocative of memory, shot with considered motion, a searing mood underlined by a transcendental score by Emile Mosseri (who, following up The Last Black Man in San Francisco and Kajillionaire, is becoming one of the most promising new movie composers), and entrancing cinematography courtesy of Lachlan Milne that captures its world in astounding splendor. It’s the lilting atmosphere and intimacy of Kore-eda, the tranquility of Malick, the still subtlety of Reichardt; and yet it’s all of these and entirely Lee Isaac Chung at the same time. His farming scenes pay attention to the uniqueness of the plots, the Korean crop that Jacob hopes to sell to other immigrants throughout the American South. It’s Grandma Soon-ja though, who plants the titular minari, a Korean parsley-like vegetable, near a creek in the woods on their property -an isolated and out-of-the-way spot that of course carries significant symbolism.
The discourse surrounding Minari has sadly come to be dominated by the controversy of its categorization in various awards shows. On that subject, I’ll co-sign Mark Harris’ statement that it isn’t just one of the best American movies, but one of the MOST American movies of 2020. Language has nothing to do with what denotes a movies’ nationality or culture in the twenty-first century and awards organizations would do well to realize that. And Minari is worthy of awards. Few films have offered this perspective and this insight on that critical American idea, and done so with such a humbling, affecting elegance. It opens the floodgates too for so many more stories about the immigrant experience, similar yet different in so many ways, that have been stifled for too long. Stories that redefine what makes an American -it’s time for their moment in the spotlight.
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