Exuberant exploration of Singapore’s 1 percent
Before it whisks you off on the sunniest, most extravagant Singaporean holiday imaginable, “Crazy Rich Asians” begins on a dark and stormy night.
When Eleanor Young (a mesmerizing Michelle Yeoh) arrives dripping wet at an exclusive London hotel, the snob at the front desk declines her booking and advises her to stay elsewhere (“May I suggest Chinatown?”). He’s hopelessly unaware that he’s dealing with one of the world’s wealthiest families, or that the tables will soon be satisfyingly turned. In this juicily poised scoresettler of a movie, the crime of underestimating an opponent is always met with a swift, humiliating comeuppance.
The opening sequence — the first and last time a white actor appears onscreen — makes a nice teaser for the movie itself. Directed with a personal touch by Jon M. Chu from a spirited if uneven script by Peter Chiarelli and Adele Lim, this adaptation of Kevin Kwan’s 2013 international best-seller is many things: a tour de force of lifestyle pornography; a slick, enjoyable divertissement; a surprisingly trenchant study of class and cultural difference. Most of all, it’s a concerted effort by a longneglected Hollywood minority to storm the big-studio citadel and possibly even beat it at its own game.
The film’s heroine is not the formidable Eleanor but rather the sweet, guileless Rachel Chu (Constance Wu), a professor who has been dating Eleanor’s dreamy son, Nick (Henry Golding). Due back in Singapore for the summer wedding of his best friend, Colin (Chris Pang), Nick is serious enough about Rachel that he invites her to come and meet his family, whom he’s been fairly tight-lipped about until now. It’s not until she finds herself flying first class that Rachel begins to guess why that might be the case.
“We’re comfortable,” Nick admits. But it falls to Rachel’s college pal Goh Peik Lin (Awkwafina) to inform her that she’s basically dating a Rockefeller. A Singapore local, Peik Lin recaps how the Youngs and other families left China generations ago for this island nation and transformed it into a cosmopolitan wonderland. These billionaire clans sneer at mainland China and its nouveau riche vulgarians. But they reserve a special contempt for Americans, with their selfish insistence on individualism over family loyalty.
In these old-moneyed enclaves, an Asian-American career woman like Rachel isn’t just a fish out of water; she’s a fish in a Darwinian shark tank. Rachel is regarded as little more than a gold digger by Nick’s boorish buddies, smirking aunties and beautiful ex-girlfriend (Jing Lusi). She also gets a polite but frosty greeting from Eleanor, who’s determined to keep her son from marrying someone so illequipped to shoulder the Young dynasty.
The most important judgment will be rendered by Nick’s grandmother, played by the veteran Chinese-American actress Lisa Lu. But Rachel has her allies among Nick’s family, too.
Director Chu makes a similarly energetic emcee, sensibly not even trying to avoid the trap of reveling in what he satirizes. Best known until now for cranking out “G.I. Joe” and “Now You See Me” sequels, Chu has an exquisite eye for color and movement that comes vibrantly into play here.
The movie has a distinct emphasis on family, as we see when the Youngs gather to make dumplings together, in a scene that brings the central dramatic tension to the fore. In a performance that never lapses into dragon-lady stereotype, Yeoh articulates the unique relationship between Asian parents and their children, the chain of love, guilt, devotion and sacrifice that binds them for eternity.