How big is your sweet tooth? Based on your answer, mileage may vary with Andrew Ahn’s modernization of “The Wedding Banquet,” a charming remake that stands on its own at the expense of discarding so much of what made the original so engaging. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it does make for a less interesting movie.
This remake opts for a more straightforward plotting than the original and cuts the charade of the plot quickly, substituting the original’s subdued emotional depths for heart-on-its-sleeve resolutions. This neatness makes for a lovely time at the movies that provides easy answers and heartwarming tearjerker moments, but the cleanness leaves something to be desired.
Ang Lee’s 1993 original mostly revolved around a “La Cage aux Folles”-esque farce, wherein a Taiwanese immigrant and his white boyfriend must put on a ruse for the former’s elderly parents, pretending that he is married to a Chinese woman who is, in reality, their tenant. Ahn’s reimagining, co-written with the original’s co-writer, James Schamus, centers two gay couples, two men and two women. The quartet all live together in Seattle and the two couples have their own issues.
Lee (Lily Gladstone) and Angela (Kelly Marie Tran) are going on their third, now unaffordable, in vitro fertilization treatment, while Chris (Bowen Yang) and Min (Han Gi-chan) manage relationship turbulence after the latter proposes and the former suspects him of doing so only to keep his visa. Soon, Min proposes to Angela instead and explains that it would keep him in the country and that his family could provide money for their IVF. Things get messier when Min tells his stern, mega-wealthy Korean grandmother, Ja-Young (Youn Yuh-jung), that he is marrying Angela, and she comes to town expecting a heterosexual marriage. But this charade is quickly seen through, and the film’s conflicts soon derive from misunderstandings.
Ahn and Schamus center these misunderstandings as interpersonal rather than intercultural dynamics. This is a welcome change from many queer film scripts’ exterior societal pressures, yet those are still present and the script succumbs to cliches, often taking the easy way out. The original film is much rougher around the edges than this remake, but those textured edges are what make it so timeless. There’s a messy humanity to it that is mostly absent here. By dethorning the premise, much is lost in exchange for comfort.
Youn Yuh-jung is the undeniable standout of the movie, as she arrives with a steely reserve that injects inherent gravitas into the goings-on. The main ensemble cannot compete with her, as they generally play scenes too safe or obviously, seemingly in fear of pushing any boundaries — lest the film’s “dramedic” tone lean too far into drama — save for the radiant Gladstone who delivers a funny, tender and nuanced performance.
The only competition Youn faces for the title of MVP is Joan Chen as May Chen, Angela’s overbearing and attention-seeking mother, whose allyship has become her personality. One scene between Chen and Youn is the film’s most affecting. They silently bond over shared experiences, and their quiet understanding of each other is very touching, yet their scene is cut short for another moment of the quartet’s strife over easily addressed misunderstandings. Neither that drama nor the performances are engaging enough to justify cutting two master actors’ screen time short, but Youn and Chen show up to play enough times throughout the film to score real winning points.
Most frustratingly, Angela and Chris’ respective dramas merge into a tamely scripted situation, which renders it far more boring than in the original. These two undergo the largest arcs in the film as they try to grow past their inability to communicate their needs with their partners, but they are simply too grown as people to be as irresponsible and avoidant as they are, which the script never addresses head-on.
Maybe these tensions could be more interestingly realized with a director making more daring choices than Ahn, but his approach doesn’t provoke too much. He opts for lots of handheld camerawork to ensure the audience understands the drama’s weight, but often can’t commit and reverts to punctuating those heavy moments with comedic stingers that don’t land.
This lack of real weight also affects the general premise, with the class dynamics of its leads often left unexplored despite Min seeming to have access to a massive wealth that the rest of the very crunchy, granola-gay group doesn’t. It’s that unwillingness the script has to have the hard conversation that leads to an overreliance on millennial domesticity as a comfortable default where sincerity feels more saccharine, enough to make one pucker.
None of this is to say that this film is a failure. It’s a very competent mid-spring charmer that is certain to draw laughs and tears from those who see it. An underlying feeling that no scene is mined for all its worth doesn’t fully topple the movie, but it does make it feel disappointing. Yet, in the quieter weeks before the summer movie season kicks into high gear, this sweet but unambitious indie movie can still be a welcome antidote to the bigger, louder films to come.
