Dìdi (Chinese: 弟弟; lit. 'Younger Brother') is a 2024 American coming-of-agecomedy drama film, written, directed, and produced by Sean Wang in his directorial debut. The film stars Izaac Wang and Joan Chen. Carlos López Estrada, Josh Peters and Chris Columbus serve as producers and executive producers under their AntiGravity Academy, Spark Features and Maiden Voyage Pictures banners, respectively. The film portrays Chris, a Taiwanese-American eighth grader (Wang) at the dawn of social media. Chris regularly uses social media to escape from his underwhelming childhood and overburdened mother (Chen), but the Internet also accentuates his preexisting feelings of internalized racism and personal inadequacy.
Dìdi had its world premiere at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival on January 19, 2024, where it won the Audience Award: U.S. Dramatic and U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award: Ensemble.[3] It was released in the United States by Focus Features on July 26, 2024. It received positive reviews and was named one of the top 10 independent films of 2024 by the National Board of Review.[4]
Plot
In the summer of 2008, 13-year-old Chris Wang (often called Dì Di) lives in a middle-class neighborhood of Fremont, California, with his Taiwanese immigrant mother Chungsing, her demanding mother-in-law Nǎi Nai,[a] and his older sister Vivian. Chris rarely sees his father, who has moved back to Taiwan for work and supports the family in America with remittances. Chris constantly bickers with Vivian, who is about to leave for UC San Diego. He is not one of the popular kids at school. He makes silly YouTube videos with best friends Fahad and Soup, which incorporate a great deal of juvenile humor.
Chris's behavior and feelings of inadequacy begin to strain his relationships. Chris uses AIM and Facebook to strike up a friendship with his crush, the half-Asian Madi. When they go on a date, she reveals internalized racism and tells Chris he is attractive "for an Asian." She tries to initiate a sexual encounter, but Chris is too nervous to continue. Although Madi tries to reach out after the incident, he is too embarrassed to speak to her and blocks her on AIM. During a group hangout with Fahad, Chris disgusts Fahad's African-American crush by cracking a casually misogynistic joke and luridly describing how he and Fahad once fooled around with a dead squirrel. Fahad decides to distance himself from Chris, lest his crush realize that Fahad's sense of humor is similarly immature. When Fahad demotes him from his "top eight friends" list on MySpace,[b] Chris is devastated.
Chris begins to realize that his mother is under great stress. Chungsing and Chris have dinner with another Taiwanese mother and her son, Max. The mother makes Chungsing ashamed that Vivian did not get into Berkeley or UCLA. Chungsing criticizes Chris' academics in front of Max, hoping the humiliation will motivate him to study harder. At the mother's suggestion, Chungsing sends Chris to a cram school, where Max's friend Josh ruthlessly bullies him. In addition, although Nǎi Nai is warm and grandmotherly to Chris, she harshly criticizes Chungsing's parenting and negatively compares her to her absent son. Chris overhears Chungsing lose her temper and threaten to send Nǎi Nai back to Taiwan. Finally, Chungsing is disappointed when a local painting competition rejects her submission.
Chris sees an opportunity to become cool when a trio of older skateboarders recruit him to film highlight reels for them. Still smarting from Madi's comment that he is cute for an Asian, he tells the skateboarders (who are white and African-American) that he is half-Asian. They take him to a party where he tries alcohol and marijuana; when he gets sick, Vivian covers for him. He reconciles with Vivian before she leaves for college. The skateboarders visit Chris' home and find his footage unusable. Chungsing, unaware of Chris' deception, greets the skateboarders and reveals that Chris is not half-Asian. Chris angrily berates his mother to get her to leave. The other boys are shocked to see Chris treat his mother rudely, and leave in disapproval.
At cram school, Chris hits Josh after Josh mocks him for his failed date with Madi, and is nearly expelled. In the car back home, Chris yells at Chungsing, calling her a failed artist who does not contribute to the family. Chungsing bitterly responds that Chris is an embarrassment to the family and that she might have been a successful painter if Vivian and Chris had never been born. Chris runs away from home for a night. When Chris returns home, Chungsing conciliates him by recounting how Vivian also ran away from home when she was 14 and that as much as she likes to paint, her children are her true dream.
On the first day of high school, Chris attempts to reconcile with Madi after months of ignoring her. She rebuffs him citing that he beat up her friend Josh. He joins a club for visual arts, and Fahad nods hello when Chris greets him. Chungsing picks up Chris from school, and he tells her about his day.
After Antarctica (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (2024)
Dìdi (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (2024)
Notice to Quit (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (2024)
The film score was composed by Giosuè Greco, who also scored Wang's Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó (2023). The score was released digitally on July 26, 2024, through Back Lot Music, and on vinyl five days later through Mondo.[10] The film also includes a number of songs from the 2000s; music supervisor Toko Nagata drew from the pop punk and hip hop music that was popular in that time period.[11] Nagata received permission from Future Islands to use one of their albums, but Wang vetoed it as its inclusion would have been anachronistic with the film's mid-2008 setting.[11] The film features "Touchdown Turnaround (Don’t Give Up on Me)" by Hellogoodbye used as a ringtone.[11]Motion City Soundtrack wrote "Stop Talking", their first new song in over a decade, for the film's closing credits; they got in touch after Wang's Instagram story about their performance at the When We Were Young festival.[12][13] The single was released digitally on August 8, 2024, and was also released on 7-inch vinyl; its music video was also directed by Wang and features actors from Dìdi in character filming a YouTube video on a camcorder.[14][15]
The film was available for premium digital rental and sale on September 3, 2024, and was released on Blu-ray on October 29, 2024.[25]
Reception
Critical reception
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 96% of 122 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 7.9/10. The website's consensus reads: "A semi-autobiographical love letter to teenage angst that's also slyly self-critical, Dìdi is a deeply moving personal statement by writer-director Sean Wang."[26]Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 78 out of 100, based on 37 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.[27]
In her review for The Guardian, Adrian Horton described Dìdi as "easily one of the best, most seamless films [she's] seen on the experience of growing up online" and declared that it has a "clear antecedent" in Eighth Grade (2018).[28]Bob Mondello of NPR wrote that the film "has plenty to say about social media changes and cultural identity, and ends up feeling a lot like its pintsized hero – cute, charming, exasperating, promising."[29]
^"准备好了吗？北京展映排片表来了，内含重大福利！" [Are you ready? The Beijing screening schedule is here, with great benefits!]. Beijing International Film Festival (in Chinese). Retrieved June 4, 2024.
^"错过就不再！这届电影节最珍稀的放映，居然还有票？！" [Don't miss it! The rarest screening of this year's film festival, there are still tickets available? !]. Beijing International Film Festival (in Chinese). Retrieved May 3, 2024.
_poster.jpg)
