Review | The Half of It film review: gay Chinese teen romance on Netflix marks belated return of Alice Wu, director of Saving Face
- In a conservative American town where she is the only Asian girl, shy Ellie Chu is drawn into a charade that will expose her secret – that she is a lesbian
- Alice Wu’s film falls short in its portrayal of how the town’s values weigh on its protagonists, but succeeds thanks to the authenticity of its young cast
3.5/5 stars
Edmond Rostand’s classic romance Cyrano de Bergerac is given a 21st century makeover in Alice Wu’s The Half of It, arriving 16 years after her debut feature, Saving Face.
The film missed its theatrical premiere after April’s Tribeca Film Festival was postponed indefinitely due to the coronavirus pandemic, but still managed to pick up the festival’s top prize for best narrative feature, awarded remotely. The Half of It is now streaming worldwide on Netflix.
Set in the remote, fiercely religious upstate New York town of Squahamish, Wu’s sophomore feature centres on high school senior Ellie Chu (Leah Lewis), a shy, straight-A student, who immigrated to the US from China at a young age with her father (Collin Chou), the town’s stationmaster.
Ellie makes extra cash ghostwriting homework assignments for her classmates, but faces an emotional quandary when she is hired to write a love letter by slow-witted jock Paul (Daniel Diemer).
The problem is that Ellie is supposed to help Paul win the heart of Aster (Alexxis Lemire), the most beautiful girl in school, for whom Ellie also harbours a secret crush. Strapped for cash, Ellie takes the assignment, only for Aster to respond enthusiastically to Paul’s (that is, Ellie’s) articulate, literate, and poetic prose.
The two girls begin a passionate correspondence, and the charade also draws Paul and Ellie closer together. But when Aster agrees to go on a date with Paul, it is only a matter of time before their ruse is exposed and Ellie’s own secret comes to light.
Where Rostand’s hero suffered a crisis of confidence due to his ridiculously long nose, Ellie’s only handicaps are her perceived otherness, as the town’s only Asian girl and a closet lesbian to boot. To Wu’s credit, she refuses to use these elements as a narrative crutch, and instead her film is a reassuringly conventional coming-of-age romcom, albeit with a young, gay Chinese girl at its centre.
The film does touch upon the struggles faced by Ellie’s father, whose limited language skills, coupled with the loss of his wife, have hobbled his plans to chase the American dream. Ellie’s sense of responsibility towards her father threatens to impact her choice of where to go for college, but as her friendship with Paul helps expand her social circle, she begins to take charge of her own destiny.
Where the film stumbles is in its portrayal of Squahamish, a conservative community harbouring fiercely outdated values, where teenagers regularly marry straight out of high school. It’s an environment that weighs heavily on many of the film’s protagonists.
These include Aster, whose father is the deacon, and whose boyfriend she already knows is planning to announce their engagement at graduation, despite not actually proposing. The community recalls the setting of 1980s teen classic Footloose but disappointingly, the set-up lacks a worthwhile pay-off.
Despite its slightly unbalanced narrative, The Half of It ultimately succeeds, in large part thanks to the authenticity of its three young leads, even when their surroundings don’t always ring true.
The Half of it is streaming on Netflix.
