All good things must come to an end. After another week of Asian-American and international cinema, the 25th annual San Diego Asian Film Festival ended. Many celebrations were held. Amongst the fanfare, Todd Gloria, the first person of Asian heritage to serve as San Diego’s Mayor, proclaimed the week of the 7-16th as “San Diego Asian Film Festival Week” in the City of San Diego. Of course, such a momentous occasion would have to be followed by an equally commemorative film.
“New Wave” is the directorial debut of Elizabeth Ai, a Vietnamese-American director and producer. Ai was kind enough to appear at Regal Edwards Mira Mesa and introduce her film to the “biggest audience” it had ever been screened to. What started in 2019 as a production she made during her pregnancy that she wanted to eventually share with her daughter blossomed into something far more. A love letter to her past and future.
The film is a documentary primarily focusing on the boom of the new wave genre amongst Vietnamese refugees in the 1970s and 80s. Throughout the film, Ai crafts a connection between the experiences of those in the music industry during that period and her own experience living in post-Vietnam America. Despite primarily being an informational documentary focusing on the effects of a particular period on an underrepresented group of people, a significant portion of the movie is dedicated to the director herself. In fact, the last 20-30 minutes of the film features several private discussions between her and her absent mother as they attempt to mend their broken relationship. Ai eventually gains a new understanding of her mom’s circumstances and learns to forgive her.
Preceding “New Wave” was a short film by Trace Le who also composed original music for the film’s soundtrack. The short film is loosely connected to the overarching plot of “New Wave,” focusing primarily on the generational gap between an Asian mother and daughter. It’s about as basic as it gets and could easily be shelved amongst the recent heaps of autobiographical stories that get pushed out regularly. However, it’s obvious the two films as a coupling do have merit between one another. Whereas Ai takes a literal approach to her story and chooses to be as personal as possible, Le metaphorizes her life as if hiding behind a curtain. Trace Le’s “No More Sad Songs” could benefit from expansion but would need to be substantially rebuilt to be worth more than it takes. A pretty picture with seldom pathos is still just a pretty picture.
In this way, “New Wave” and its preceding film are almost the same. It’s not so much a product of its time but more a coupon long expired. What initially begins as a nostalgic run-through of experiences we thought we’d forgotten eventually morphs into something of a memoir. It’s obvious the 70s backdrop of the film is meant to be a foundation for the true story at hand but that begs the question, why? There are many answers presented throughout the film but none are satisfactory.
As previously mentioned, it’s clear that Ai is trying to weave a connective tissue between herself and fellow Vietnamese refugees from that time. Uniting everyone through shared trauma and the methods people would use to escape. New wave music was there for people when they needed to pretend they were somewhere else and forget about all of life’s woes. It wasn’t just a music genre but a lifestyle. However, in Ai’s experience, her escape quickly dies and instead serves as a reminder of the people she lost during that time. This almost certainly isn’t everyone’s experience so perhaps her true intention was to highlight the diversity of voices amongst those who lived through that time. This would explain the abundant focus on prominent Vietnamese new wave figures like Ian Nguyen and Lynda Trang Dai. However, their stories also feature strong themes of parental neglect and generational gaps. Likely, Ai didn’t anticipate this would happen. She probably wasn’t aware that so many people would connect to a story she felt so centralized in, and while the circumstances are extraordinary, that doesn’t necessarily translate to the film.
“New Wave” is the ultimate artistic nightmare. It’s what happens when you hold onto the things you’ve held inside and let them become the anchor by which you’ve shaped your perspective. Your world and the world you created in your head blur together so far that you can hardly tell what reality is anymore. Your assumptions become truths and your delusions become facts. However, something about this denotation still feels a little too self-aware for the product we received.
The modern cinematic moniker is a rat race to see who can create the most personal film imaginable. To see who can venture into the depths of their psyche and share everything they possibly can with the world. Perhaps this is an offshoot of what has become vlog-style, cinéma vérité content, simply vehicles for portraying the artist’s lifestyle. “New Wave” does somewhat break that mold and essentially presents a film that’s almost entirely about the author, but cleverly masked under the pretense of being an informational documentary. However, the payoff to the reveal, if one could even call it that, is poorly set up with haphazardly paced self-inserts and references. The main subject, Ai herself, doesn’t feel like an adequate subject until the last few scenes. The ending, while powerful, doesn’t justify how it was presented.
It gets many things right, the aesthetics, the characters, the niche references and commentary. However, it’s all executed in a way that isn’t entertaining or gratifying to complete. Its lack of depth ultimately holds it back from weighing more than it does. Its most compelling elements are held back by an, at best, shaky foundation.
For what it’s worth, thematically speaking, “New Wave” also shares an intrinsic connection to the San Diego Asian Film Festival itself. As mentioned, escapism and coping with circumstances are prominent motifs throughout the film. In a way, the San Diego Asian Film Festival is a modern-day escape from the hustle and bustle of our complex world. Multiple speakers echoed this sentiment during the festival including artistic director Brian Hu. Meta-textually, “New Wave” was the ideal choice to cap off a week predicated by uncertainty and certainly was more than enough to make audiences forget that.
Turn off the Bright Lights 