Every time I look back at movies through the years, I find myself wondering why The Joy Luck Club did not make a huge splash in the awards circle. The film is one of the BEST FILMS of my lifetime. It will always represent to me, the dream that is America.
I think it's because the emotions of the film are so universal, that I count it as one of my favorites. I am male, I am hispanic, I came to the United States when I was 13 years old. I felt alienated, lonely and hopeless, could anyone really understand all that I wanted to do, all that I wanted to become. How do you reconcile your cultural roots, with wanting to fit into the American Dream.
I try to watch The JOY LUCK CLUB as often as I try to read the book. Because it reminds me that we are all connected in so many ways. That our dreams and desires are not all together different. that Love reaches beyond race, beyond politics and beyond time.
when I saw this film I thought, The Academy of Arts and Sciences would gush over it. But it never reached the kind of acclaim it truly deserved. I think it's because most film makers field of personal experience limited in reaching and feeling. Most of the Academy comes from back grounds that didn't see struggle, that doesn't see the world in unison, but in carefully separated categories. This to them was not a human experience film, it was a film for a minority group. But, while The JOY LUCK CLUB is life affirming to some, to those who have lived the similarities, it is life changing.
