Minari Tells the Story of a Family Trying to Make It in America
The film is up for six Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director. Apr 25, 2021
The title comes from the herb minari, a resilient plant that can grow just about anywhere. Set in 1980s Arkansas, Lee Isaac Chung’s semi-autobiographical Oscar-nominated film follows the travails of the Yi family’s dream to cultivate a land of one’s own during a time in Reagan-era America where 30,000 Koreans moved to the United States every year. I took the metaphor of resiliency as a cue to steel myself for the possibility of the Yi’s looming bankruptcy, or run-ins with racist white people, or worse. Instead, what unfolds is a gentle drama about the memories of a boy not-so-quietly observing his parents’ troubled marriage, and, more broadly, the family’s place in the constellation of American imperialism.
LUSTER
by Raven Leilani (Picador £14.99, 240 pp)
This debut was a big deal in America last year and hits the UK riding a tsunami of praise.
Edie is 23, living in a mouse-ridden flat, floundering in her job in publishing and with a history of ill-judged sexual relationships, when she starts an online flirtation with Eric, an older, married, white man.
Before long, Edie has moved in with Eric, his wife Rebecca and their adopted 12-year-old black daughter, Akila.
Edie sleeps with Eric, has a strangely intimate friendship with Rebecca, strikes up a tentative relationship with Akila and decides she’s happy to take the cash that keeps appearing mysteriously in her room, despite the nature of the transaction being far from clear.
WW84Is there any particular reason for
WW84 which, to be clear, is the only title that ever appears on screen, rather than
Wonder Woman 1984 to be set in 1984? That would seem to be a fair question, just as much as asking why the first one was set during The Great War. After all, once we’ve established that Diana (Gal Gadot) doesn’t really age, and that she’s still active in our present-day timeline to become part of the Justice League, a Wonder Woman story could take place in any era. So, other than a chance to make snarky jokes about parachute pants and mall aerobics classes, why 1984?