An American coming of age story like you’ve never watched on the big screen before, ‘DÌDI’ opens this weekend and it is a must watch. I caught up with the stars and the visionary filmmaker for a Zoom press conference and here are a couple of takeaways to whet your appetite.
Dìdi is the story of a boy who navigates the opposing forces of his upbringing and background all the while trying to be just a regular American 13-year old. It is the debut feature written and directed by Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Sean Wang. At its world premiere, in competition at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival, the film received critical and audience acclaim, winning both the U.S. Dramatic Audience Award and the U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Best Ensemble Cast. But it’s not a drama, not really. And it’s not a slapstick comedy either, not quite. It’s the sort of film that lives in shades of grey and somehow burrows deep inside one’s heart.
Izaac Wang gets directions from filmmaker Sean Wang on the set of ‘Dìdi’
Wang is an excellent writer, painting (pardon the pun in advance, you’ll understand later) great multi-dimensional characters, including the mom figure, who is an aspiring painter — voilà — and is played in beautiful nuances by Chinese American megastar Joan Chen. In the clearly autobiographical role of Chris Wang, a.k.a Wang Wang, Wang the filmmaker cast the brilliant Izaac Wang, no relation, who is known for the 2019 film Good Boys as well as Disney’s Raya and the Last Dragon.
These are casting coups and to round it all up, Wang also cast Shirley Chen as Wang Wang’s older sister Vivian and his own grandmother Zhang Li Hua, who was also featured in his 2023 Oscar-nominated documentary short Nai Nai & Wai Po, as, you guessed, the grandmother.
The title of the film, Dìdi, is an affectionate term in Mandarin for “little brother” although, apart from his mom Chungsing, no one seems to feel tenderness for the abrasive Wang Wang — who hides his insecurities by chasing people out of his life. Like the love interest Madi (played by Mahaela Park) who is left wondering why he blocks her on social media.
“I’ve always been drawn to stories and movies about youth, I don't know why,” Sean Wang admits, “I think there's just a time in all of our lives for anyone who's been a teenager. It's this time that's so formative and turbulent, and small things feel big and big things are big. And yeah, I've always been really drawn to movies like Stand By Me and 400 Blows and Ratcatcher, and you know, even like Waterlilies and I’ve always just really been drawn to those types of stories, and when I kind of grew into my own as a filmmaker, and thought about the stories I wanted to tell, I thought, oh, and in all of those stories that I love about adolescents and childhood that didn't pander to kids, I never saw the version that starred a kid who looked like me or Izaac, you know that version of boyhood.”
About Wang having drawn such perfectly written, nuanced characters, Joan Chen gushes, “You know, I hadn't encountered a good part like that for a while,” and after going to China when the parts had “dried off in a way, “ as Chen puts it, she was thrilled to get Wang’s script.
“I was impressed how well written that script is, a great coming of age story as well wrapped in it, a love letter to his own mom,” Chen, a mom herself admits. “So, even though she is a supporting character., she has many facets, and it's quite complete and full and complex. And different from a lot of movies like Crazy, Rich Asians, [which feature] that matriarch that is strict and stern, and Joy Luck Club. And this very real genuine, gentle and you know, full of warmth. She is also an artist, and she has a sense of humor, even though she is not well adjusted to American culture, and she's confused about how to really best love her son.”
The shades of the mom and son relationship are so well written in Dìdi that the film managed to also change the relationship between Izaac Wang and his own mother. “This film changed a lot between me and my own mother's relationship,” the young actor says, “whereas before, we would always be, like, butting heads a lot and basically just being super stubborn towards each other, and we weren't really getting along at the time. But now, after this movie, and after basically bonding for a month, because we were both living in Fremont,” California, while filming Dìdi in the summer of 2023, “just us two, it was like we had this kind of connection throughout the movie, that the movie helped with. A lot more chill with each other. I love that.”
When I asked Izaac Wang what he loved about working with his director, he candidly answered, “There's a lot. There's a lot really,” before continuing, “I think one of the most fun things about working with Sean is it was like making a movie with one of my friends, you know? And I think that's kind of what was most important with working with Sean, is it just felt like we were just two friends with a bunch of other friends making a big old movie! And I think that's kind of what landed home for me. I've never really had a director like that, one I was that close with, and maybe it's because I haven't been a lead before, but it really felt like Sean tried to get close with everyone on the set,” at times unafraid to let his own guard down and act “immature” as Izaac points out, before correcting himself. “I'm not saying immature in a bad way. I'm just saying like, to show that he wasn't like, he wasn't being all like hard boiled director the whole time.”
When it was time for Sean Wang to point out his favorite aspect of working with Izaac, he pays the compliment back and says that the actor also showed him how to be himself. “If I'm not having fun directing this movie,” Wang admits “I think the movie is cooked — like it's not going to be good.”
No chance of that, as Dìdi isn’t just good, it’s wonderful! And the film opens this weekend in the US, while for the UK you’ll have to wait until next weekend, when it will hit theaters on August 2nd. The film is distributed by Universal.
All images courtesy of Focus Features, used with permission.