The Half of It (2020)

[Cranberry]

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When smart but cash-strapped teen Ellie Chu agrees to write a love letter for a jock, she doesn't expect to become his friend - or fall for his crush.

Written and directed by Alice Wu. Premiering May 1 on Netflix.

 

 

‘The Half of It’ director Alice Wu on her new Netflix teen dramedy

Alice Wu’s “The Half of It” Is Queering the Rom-Com in More Ways Than One

Alice Wu’s “The Half Of It” Lives Up to the Hype by Fulfilling and Subverting the Expectations Set by “Saving Face”

[Cranberry]

This was really good. This was similar to Sierra Burgess but with a likable protagonist and none of the more problematic elements (betraying the best friend with barely an apology afterward, kissing someone who thinks they're kissing someone else, an unearned happy ending). I expected no less from Alice Wu, though. Saving Face was also excellent.

Some of my favorite things:

How much of a cliche Trig was. He was the only thing in the movie that I'd say was stock teen romcom, and I'm sure that was on purpose. He was so over the top that I just laughed every time he said something stupid about being "Mudding King" or strutted his stuff on stage looking like an '80s rocker.

The English teacher we all had or wish we had.

The entire pool scene (which was beautifully shot), especially Aster's disappointed look when Ellie started talking about boys right after Aster said that not talking about them for once was refreshing.

Ellie's dad's speech, entirely in Chinese, about teenage Ellie, and the way Paul listened with rapt attention even though he didn't understand a word.

The way Paul got integrated into Ellie's family, in general. I loved that not only did he and Ellie become friends, but he spent time alone with her dad as well (and will continue to while she's away at school).

Paul looking up stuff about being "a gay" and realizing things aren't as black and white as he thought. Also, his mom saying she'd still love him if he were gay, but being angry that he wanted to change the family sausage recipe.

The public confession scene that skirted cliche by making only the three people at the center understand what was actually being confessed.

Aster slapping Paul while staring daggers through Ellie. Perfect.

The hopeful ending and the kiss I was not expecting (although I should have known Paul's speech about kissing the girl when you see that look on her face would matter later. Ellie's no putz).

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Taco sausage! As fun as it is to say, I think that sausage taco is more accurate.

This was a fun sweet movie. I liked that although none of the three main characters ended up in a romantic relationship with each other in the end, they were all still in a good place. I also liked that we got glimpses of Ellie's relationship with her dad and a tiny bit of Paul's relationship with his mom.

I know Leah Lewis from Nancy Drew so I knew it was her as soon as I heard her voice. Despite the fact that her character on Nancy Drew doesn't wear a lot of makeup or get dressed up very often, she looked noticeably younger here.

One thing I really liked was that when Paul initially approached Ellie and said that he totally loooooooved Aster, Ellie pointed out that he didn't actually love her or even know anything about her (which, to be fair, is often true of teenage relationships). Let's be real - he thought Aster was pretty. That's it.

Trig was a typical clueless teenage boy, but I didn't like the fact that no one ever addressed the fact that Aster was cheating on him, knowing that he was talking to her dad about marrying her. If you're not into him, just break up with him. Don't get me wrong - Trig was ridiculously obnoxious to propose to his high school girlfriend in the middle of church, but it was still wrong for Aster to sneak around behind his back.

Edited May 3, 2020 by ElectricBoogaloo

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Teen Vogue interview with Daniel Diemer (Paul) - includes his personal taco sausage recipe!

[arc]

2 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Trig was a typical clueless teenage boy, but I didn't like the fact that no one ever addressed the fact that Aster was cheating on him

And also, how did they do it? It seemed like Squahamish was so small everyone in town woulda noticed Aster had multiple dinner dates with a guy who wasn’t Trig.

(I greatly enjoyed the movie otherwise.)

[Mabinogia]

2 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Trig was ridiculously obnoxious to propose to his high school girlfriend in the middle of church, but it was still wrong for Aster to sneak around behind his back.

It might have been wrong but she's also a teenage girl who seems to be under a lot of pressure to do what everyone wants her to do. It sounds like her family wanted her with Trig, Trig wanted her with Trig, her "friends" wanted her with Trig and she just felt like it was what she was supposed to do. I can't fault her too much for not dumping him over some guy she can't really figure out (because he's a guy and a girl manipulating her into falling for him).

I do like that it ended with none of them dating but all of them moving out of the role they thought they were supposed to be living to make other people happy and pursuing the lives that will make them happy which, if their families truly love them, will also make their families happy. 

I really liked the movie. I found all three main characters very engaging and bought the slow growth of their relationships. There was some heavy handedness, like Ellie's waxing poetic about losing herself in Aster's mind or whatever, but I can just dismiss that as Ellie being a super pretentious book nerd. lol Because it was clear she was into Aster before she got to know her any better than Paul. But it was interesting that as their rouse continued Ellie fell more for Aster while Paul fell more for Ellie. And Aster, well, she got manipulated so she doesn't really know who she is into now. Hope she meets someone nice in art school. 

 

[arc]

I also liked the subtle issue that Aster was from (apparently) the only other POC family in town, but she has some passing privilege if she chooses.

[backhometome]

My fav. part was the friendship with Ellie/Paul they were so adorable. I cared about them way more than whoever Aster got with. So I loved the ending. 

[Cranberry]

6 hours ago, arc said:

I also liked the subtle issue that Aster was from (apparently) the only other POC family in town, but she has some passing privilege if she chooses.

Yeah, I liked how the bathroom scene (in which she and Ellie overheard some other girls talking about her) made it sound like her popularity was tenuous and mostly based on her being with Trig. The girls certainly had no problem laughing about how her family didn't own their house. It makes sense that she'd want to connect with Ellie, another outsider not born in Squahamish, even before any of the events of the movie.

On that note, I thought it was a nice touch that after she helped Ellie pick up her dropped belongings in the hallway, one of which was the book The Remains of the Day, she was reading The Remains of the Day on her phone during church.

[peachmangosteen]

3 hours ago, arc said:

I also liked the subtle issue that Aster was from (apparently) the only other POC family in town, but she has some passing privilege if she chooses.

I did not even realize she was a POC lol.

What a cute little movie. It was very comforting. 

[arc]

2 hours ago, peachmangosteen said:

I did not even realize she was a POC lol.

It’s barely mentioned directly, but there are hints here and there. And offline, the director said she talked to the actress about the character being able to “pass” if she wanted to:

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Ellie and her dad live in an all white town, except for Aster's family, the Flores family. They're the only other real people of color that we see in the film. But something that I talked to Alexxis Lemire, who plays Aster, a lot about, is this notion of passing. They're people of color, but they're also very "respectable." The father is a deacon in the church; they're handsome; Aster is dating the big man on campus. You can see the struggle she goes through, where she feels like she's "passing," and yet she doesn't fully. It's a different kind of thing to deal with than Ellie does. Ellie is obviously an immigrant person of color and has a different kind of experience lobbied against her. But I feel like these two girls can also understand each other on this other level of not being entirely of the dominant culture.

 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

The only hints in the movie that I recall of Aster being non-white were her last name and at the very end when she came out of the Mexican restaurant to talk to Ellie (and I really only noticed that because before I watched the movie, someone online mentioned that her family owned the Mexican restaurant in town but that her dad had a Spanish accent). 

Not only does Aster have the advantage of passing but her father is respected because of his position in the church which gives her some additional status/protection.

In contrast, Ellie can’t pass for anything but Asian and her dad’s job doesn’t give their family any kind of prestigious  standing within the community. 

Those two things make a big difference. Aster is actively courted by the blonde girls to wear a matching scarf while Esther gets the racist “chugga chugga choo choo” taunts every fucking morning. 

Edited May 4, 2020 by ElectricBoogaloo

[Cranberry]

We heard them speaking a little Spanish at home, too, but yeah, it was very subtle.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Podcast interview with Alice Wu

[Cranberry]

This movie is in the Netflix Top 10 in the US and Canada today, and I'm sure other places too. I'm glad it's successful and hope we don't have to wait another 15 years for the next Alice Wu movie!

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Notes from Alice Wu about the movie:

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The first time I had my heart broken after coming out as lesbian was not by a girl, but by a guy. A straight white guy from the heartland, no less. If you had picked this guy out of a crowd and said "That boy will be your best friend," I wouldn't have believed you. But sometimes you meet someone and for whatever reasons... your "weird" works together. He helped me accept myself as gay at a time when neither of us knew any gays - and the two of us bumbled through the odd terrain of "trying to get a girl." He succeeded, to our great joy (at least one of us would not die alone!) ...and then, disaster. His new girlfriend was wary of us, despite knowing I was gay. And slowly, ineffably, the delicate calculus of our connection eroded. I recall one rainy night, the two of us crying in a car, me blurting, "I don't get it. If anything were going to happen with us, wouldn't it already have happened?" And he said, "She's not worried we'll sleep together. She's threatened by our intimacy." I always remembered that.

[...]

I wrote The Half of It as a way to work through the heartbreak of losing that friendship. In retrospect, I might have been solving for the wrong equation. I've always harbored a deep pang over what I could have done differently to keep that friendship, to stave off the heartbreak — but perhaps that was never the point. Heartbreak or not, that friendship helped me become the person I am. Those late nights spent strategizing how to win at love were never about "winning" or "love." They were about two ding-dongs who cared enough to fully see and accept each other. It is the thing I love most about Ellie and Paul, about Ellie and Aster. And in hindsight, about my friend and me.

About the ending:

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Endings are tricky because we expect answers. Fifteen years ago, with my first film Saving Face, I got one recurring question: "Is this ending... too happy?" At the time, as much as I saw the truth in it for my characters, I confessed to not knowing if that happy ending could be expected in real life; but as a queer woman, I wanted — needed — to see it in order to believe it could happen for me. [As a sidenote, 15 years later, no one ever thinks the ending is too happy! The world changed. And for that 1I'm grateful.] Now with The Half of It, I'm regularly peppered with questions over whether certain characters end up together in an ever-pointed crescendo toward "But is the ending happy?" (Ha!) My honest answer is that the point of the film isn't about who ends up with whom. It's about three people who collide in a moment-in-time before going their separate ways, each now holding the piece of themselves that allows them to become the person they are meant to be. The end of the film is each of their beginnings. And for my characters, I can think of no happier ending.

 

[peachmangosteen]

1 hour ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Notes from Alice Wu about the movie:

It's dusty in here lol!

I've never heard of Alice Wu before but I think I'm gonna have to see if I can find this Saving Face movie.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Alice Wu Breaks Down The Half Of It Opening Sequence

 

[memememe76]

I enjoyed the movie too, the Ellie/Paul friendship is one of the best male/female friendships since, I don’t know when. I was not a big fan of the church scene, even though I did laugh at Paul’s mom. 
 

I have never heard of Saving Face, I will try to check that out. I wish all the best for the three main actors. 

[EtheltoTillie]

On 5/4/2020 at 9:56 AM, peachmangosteen said:

It's dusty in here lol!

I've never heard of Alice Wu before but I think I'm gonna have to see if I can find this Saving Face movie.

It’s showing on amazon prime. 

[Scarlett45]

On 5/3/2020 at 9:16 PM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

The only hints in the movie that I recall of Aster being non-white were her last name and at the very end when she came out of the Mexican restaurant to talk to Ellie (and I really only noticed that because before I watched the movie, someone online mentioned that her family owned the Mexican restaurant in town but that her dad had a Spanish accent). 

Also her little sister sitting next to her in the church scenes. I never thought Aster was white. 

 

On 5/1/2020 at 5:30 PM, Cranberry said:

The entire pool scene (which was beautifully shot), especially Aster's disappointed look when Ellie started talking about boys right after Aster said that not talking about them for once was refreshing.

Yes that look was brilliant. 
 

I am finally getting around to watching this, it was a much much better version of a Cyrano story than Sierra Burgess is A Loser.  

[Scarlett45]

I watched Saving Face in honor of pride month and thought I should give this movie another visit. Alice Wu is such a talent, I know she took time off to care for her mom, (which of course I understand), but I want to see more of her work!