Singapore bling makes for a delicious romcom cocktail
Dir Jon M Chu Starring Constance Wu, Henry Golding, Michelle Yeoh, Gemma Chan, Awkwafina, Ken Jeong
As Hollywood’s first allasian studio production in 25 years, Crazy Rich Asians arrives burdened by expectations no glamorous romantic comedy should have to bear. (Imagine white people were only given a film of their own every quarter-century, and decided to gamble everything on Sex and the City: The Movie.) Nevertheless, Jon M Chu’s film has mounted an eye-watering assault on the American box office, where it took $137 million in less than a month, making it the most commercially successful romcom since 2009’s The Proposal. The success is well earned, not just by what the film stands for but what it is: a snapcrackling bolt of deluxe escapism that plays like a Jane Austen novel crossed with a Mr & Mrs Smith brochure.
It opens in London, 1991, where a hotel manager sniffily declines to check Eleanor Sung-young (Michelle Yeoh) and her children into the master suite, suggesting they might prefer somewhere in Chinatown. So Eleanor, wife of a Singaporean property mogul, just buys the hotel and moves in. The titular “crazy” is meant as an intensifier, not an adjective – as in, these Asians are crazy rich, bro – but they’re occasionally crazy crazy, too.
Fast-forward to 2018, and Eleanor’s son Nick (Henry Golding) is heir to the Young empire but has been studying in New York, where he has fallen for Rachel Chu (Constance Wu), a second-generation Chinese-american economics lecturer. Their chemistry simmers, rather than smokes, but both look matinée-fabulous, so the swooning mostly takes care of itself.
Joining Nick in Singapore for a friend’s wedding, Rachel finds his description of his family as “comfortable” has undersold things: they are stars of the city-state’s blingocracy. Rachel has a well-off local friend of her own, Peik Lin (Nora Lum, aka the rapper Awkwafina, from Ocean’s 8 ). But Peik Lin’s riches are decidedly nouveau – her home decor was inspired by Donald Trump’s bathroom – while the Youngs are old money, a contrast the film milks to rib-tickling effect. (Peik Lin’s stunned reactions to the Young estate are a delight.) Much of this elite circle, including Eleanor at its centre, sees Rachel as a bad match for Nick who needs to be sent packing. So the Westernised girl must learn to navigate the social scene before it eats her alive.
Crazy Rich Asians’ milieu feels all-new, but its underlying principles are not. Some are perhaps a little standard-issue – the catty gay sidekick, the dash to the airport – but it has an interesting kinship with the New York-set romantic comedies of the Fifties and Sixties, in which the city itself seems to pulse with promise. Singaporean landmarks such as the Marina Bay Sands – three svelte towers linked by a roof garden – look like the architectural manifestation of a bright future, as the Manhattan skyline in How to Marry a Millionaire surely once did. Then there’s the food, showcased in hunger-pang-inducing close-up and sautéed in symbolism, from the familial ritual of dumplingmaking to the harmonious clash of cuisines at a raucous night market.
The same goes for the clothes: each outfit is mouthwatering, but loaded with social and cultural tells. The real power-dresser is Eleanor, who exudes a hushed, don’t-cross-me regality, and whose well-masked vulnerabilities offer an intriguing new angle on the Tiger Mother. At a time when Hollywood seems intent on making films that might have come from anywhere, all hail the romcom that understands specificity is strength.