“If it’s for good, it’s not really a lie.”
Family is an important factor in who we grow to become. Their presence, or even lack thereof, plays a big part in how we identify ourselves, who we will come to love, and how we view the world around us. And after spending a lifetime with the consistent presence of our loved ones, when suddenly have to face the mortality of our beloved mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles, or grandparents, coming to terms with the fact that they will not always be there can be a daunting task. The Farewell examines the issue of how a family deals with losing a loved one that has buoyed the family for so long, what responsibility the rest of the family has toward them during their final days, and the effect our family dynamic has how we come to view ourselves.
The Farewell follows Chinese-born, U.S.-raised Billi (Awkwafina) who, after finding her beloved grandmother Nai Nai (Shuzhen Zhou) has been given barely three months to live, returns to Changchun, China to see the matriarch, despite objections from her family who plan to not tell Nai Nai of her imminent death and don’t trust Billi to keep the secret. The family assure her happiness, they gather under the joyful guise of an expedited wedding, uniting family members scattered among new homes abroad. As Billi navigates a minefield of family expectations and proprieties, she finds there’s a lot to celebrate: a chance to rediscover the country she left as a child, her grandmother’s wondrous spirit, and the ties that keep on binding even when so much goes unspoken.
The family’s decision to not tell Nai Nai of her fatal bout with lung cancer in lieu of informing her so that she could maybe say her goodbyes to loved ones, is the question at the center of The Farewell and the moral conundrum director/writer Lulu Wang leaves the audience to wrestle with. While the film is filled with Chinese cultural and local imagery, the juxtaposition of East Asian views on responsibility to family and community to the philosophy of the Western world in which I have been reared. Billi’s uncle Haibin (Yongbo Jiang) discusses the justification for keeping the major secret from Nai Nai thusly:
“You think one’s life belongs to onself. But that’s the difference between the East and the West. In the East, a person’s life is part of a whole. Family. Society. We’re not telling Nai Nai because it is our duty to carry the emotional burden for her.”
This point is subtly hinted at and shown throughout The Farewell in smaller ways that will be familiar to many. Whether it’s Billi receiving bad news about an opportunity that she neglects to share with Nai Nai over the phone so as to not worry her or Nai Nai not telling Billi that she was in the hospital for a follow-up appointment for the same reason during the same conversation. All of us can relate to sparing some of the more difficult details of our lives from those whom we love to carry some of the emotional burden for them. While we in the West don’t take the protection to such extremes, the sentiment is still there, allowing for an emotional connection to the audience within the story. So, where is the line where lying to protect a loved one cross over into the harmful? Is it dependent on each individual familial dynamic or is shielding a loved one from the pain of the end of life morally cloudy no matter where one is from? The Farewell doesn’t really make a judgement call but instead leaves it to the audience to work through their own thoughts, feelings and experiences, the hallmark of a good film.
The Farewell is most obviously about grief and how we all handle the issue of mortality, but the film also contains a fascinating subtext surrounding the issue of how hard transition and change can be to handle within our lives. Underneath the struggle within the family to cope with their Grandmother’s terminal illness, there is also the tension regarding the sons’ decision to immigrate to Japan and the United States respectively and what that meant not only for their identities and relationship with their mother, but the path their children embarked on as well. Billi’s aunt and her mother Jian (Diana Lin) sparred over their children’s future decisions after moving to America and where it was likely, or wise, for them to stay overseas or return to China. On one side, you had the aunt, negatively deriding the inability to attain wealth quickly in America and the distance from family, whereas the mother lauded America’s openness and communal spirit. During the debate, Billi’s dad recalled their arrival to America and an offer from a church they visited to give the family the key to the place of worship so that Billi could continue her training with piano. At the end of the conversation, Billi reveals she no longer plays. The piano playing struck me as a proxy for a loss of identity, comfort, and cultural connectivity for the family, but Billi especially, in their move to the US. This hunch was bolstered in a pivotal scene between Billie and her mother later in the film where Billi describes her confusion and loneliness upon immigrating to a new world where she knew no one. Billi’s father may have not acted upon the church’s invitation to come and use their piano at their leisure, opting instead to symbolically begin their transition to aspiring Americans by leaving old habits from home behind, but Billi could have used the familiar comfort of a hobby she began in her original surroundings.
This tug and pull in immigrant communities between wanting to leave what are often painful memories you are trying to transition from behind in favor or assimilation, but wanting to hold onto cultural comforts from home, is common and a delicate balance many struggle to achieve. Transitioning to new environments can be confusing, scary, and rough, so for children like Billi, the familiar can be strengthening, making the change easier to handle. But her father’s perspective is understandable; he cane to America to achieve and give his family something better. Rightly or wrongly, certain cultural aspects can be caught in that change, even ones that maybe should be held onto. There are no easy answers and The Farewell does an admirable job in accurately depicting both sides of a challenging issue.
Awkwafina does a very good job of portraying the internal conflict present in Billi as she considers her identity as a Chinese-American woman and struggles to come to terms with her grandmother’s illness. The usual comedic actress nails the subtlety in a person trying to hide their grief and put on a brave face while internally battling questions of the morality of their actions and the depth of their feelings to the point where the pain can still be observed on the surface. The actress accomplishes this through a quality facial acting performance, emoting using only her expressions and looks and branching out into new, promising territory as a performer. As good as Awkwafina is the film, Shuzhen Zhou’s performance as Nai Nai is the standout, offering both levity and warmth as the loving, slightly bossy matriarch of the family that audience will come to adore and is worthy of awards recognition. She is charming, funny, and touching in her role creating a connection with the audience that only makes her predicament that much more emotional to observe.
The Farewell is a genuine tale of family that examines how we handle grief and interpret our own identities. Director and writer Lulu Wang does well in garnering good performances from her actors, most notably Shuzhen Zhou who steals the show as the grandmother at the center of it all and Awkwafina, who amply displays another aspect to her acting ability. What Wang also imparts well is the humanity of the characters we follow in The Farewell. It is so well executed in making the viewer realize how similar we all are, from the worry about showing the right amount of grief at funerals to just playing with household pets. Their interactions and conversations really emphasize our similarities as humans across cultures. The film is both heartwarming and heartbreaking, a thorough examination of the concept of family. Call your grandma.
Image: A24
