wayne wang Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Now, I know Wayne Wang isn't in most cinephiles' good graces these days.* He's spent most of the decade making bland and unremarkable middle-brow flicks like Maid in Manhattan, Because of Winn-Dixie and Last Holiday. But the director behind The Joy Luck Club and Chinese Box still has a fair bit of cachet, and when he does something like make his new film available in its entirety online and for free, people pay attention.

So, pay attention: Wang's The Princess of Nebraska, an indie he premiered at last year's Toronto International Film Festival (where it got a positive review from Cinematical's Kim Voynar), will be offered for free on the internet in September. The filmmaker partnered with ex-SXSW chief Matt Dentler and his Cinetic Rights Management to make this happen, as a means of releasing Princess simultaneously with its companion film, A Thousand Years of Good Prayers, which will come to theaters courtesy of Magnolia Pictures. The exact plans of the release (i.e. where, how) haven't been announced, but I'll keep an eye on it. Take a look at this IndieWire story for more.

Not, probably, the start of a new Hollywood trend, given that The Princess of Nebraska -- a no-budget drama about a pregnant Chinese teenager's struggles in the United States -- probably wouldn't have done much business anyhow. But if Dentler and his colleagues can figure out a way to get people to watch the thing, who knows. Indie filmmakers could always use a new channel.

*The exception is our own Eric D. Snider, who informs me: "I love Wang films!"

In The Princess of Nebraska, Wayne Wang's companion film to his other Toronto entry, A Thousand Years of Good Prayers, Wang tackles adapting another short story by Yiyun Li. Wang brought to life A Thousand Years of Good Prayers with methodical pacing and the careful unfolding of a story about the conflicted relationship between Mr. Shi, a Chinese father and his adult daughter, Yilan; in Princess, Wang uses an edgier style to show us 24 hours in the life of a college student some 15 years younger than Yilan, who lives in Omaha but has traveled to San Francisco.

The two stories are unrelated, but Wang uses them to contrast the subtle generational differences between a woman raised in "old-Communist" China against a younger woman raised in the post-Tiananmen Square China infused with an influence of Western capitalism and Paris Hilton. The "princess" in the story is Sasha (newcomer Ling Li), a college student in Omaha who, after a trip to Beijing and a fling with her friend Yang, finds herself unexpectedly pregnant. Sasha has traveled to San Franciso to get an abortion; why she would come so far is never made really clear, other than that Boshen (Brian Danforth), a mutual friend/lover of Yang's, lives there, and presumably he has promised her assistance.

Meticulously paced and beautifully shot, A Thousand Years of Good Prayers brings us into the life of Mr. Shi (Henry Q) at the moment he walks into a train station in Spokane, Washington, where he is greeted with seeming lack of affection by his adult daugher, Yilan (Faye Yu). Director Wayne Wang, getting back into indie film after making films like Maid in Manhattan and Because of Winn-Dixie, has made a lovely film here about the often complicated relationship between fathers and their adult daughters. The film, adapted by Yiyun Li for the screen from her short story of the same name, has much in it that was written specifically about this dynamic in Chinese families, but most anyone watching the film will find something to relate to in the interactions between Mr. Shi and his daughter.

Mr. Shi has come to Spokane to stay with his Yilan, to help her through the aftermath of a divorce. He is simultaneously overprotective and uncertain, and his presence in her spartan apartment very clearly makes Yilan uncomfortable. He's like a family knick-knack sent by a well-meaning great-aunt -- he's out of place in his daughter's apartment and her life, but because he's her father, she can't just toss him away. He fumbles about, trying to help his daughter in the only way he knows how, by cooking Chinese food for her. Abundantly. (Don't go see this film if you're hungry, you'll be craving the nearest Chinese buffet by the time it's over.)

With Heat being one of my favorite films of all time, I took the opportunity at yesterday's press junket for Bug to ask Ashley Judd if she was keen to ever work with Michael Mann again, to which she replied "I would love to work with Michael Mann again. He is a really neat, committed and very inspired filmmaker. Also a really nice guy -- my husband and I are really fond of him." I also inquired as to who she'd like to work with after Bug, and to that she said "Wayne Wang and I are talking about doing something together again, which I'm looking forward to." Wang directed Judd in 1995's Smoke, and the project she's referring to, I'm guessing, is Wang's upcoming romantic comedy Good Cook, Likes Music, about a slacker who sends away for a mail order bride and gets some life-changing woman of his dreams, or something like that. Sounds like Judd alley, no?

Judd also confirmed that she'll be appearing in Crossing Over, and had this to say about the project: "I'm getting ready to work with a guy called Wayne Kramer, and I'm really excited about that. He's a South African who immigrated to the United States a while ago, well over a decade ago I believe, perhaps longer. He's directing a script he wrote called Crossing Over, which looks at immigration issues, and I'm looking forward to that. He's put together an amazing cast. My scenes will be with Ray Liotta and a young African girl whom I've not met yet -- I'm looking forward to that. Sean Penn and Harrison Ford are also in the movie, so that's gonna be neat." She also said she's in talks with a first-time director about a project that involves human trafficking and slave labor, but no further details. Expect a full report from the junket soon.

Either Wayne Wang is about to get, like, Joss Whedon-busy, or somebody is lying to the trades on his behalf on a regular basis. Back in February, it was announced that he was going to direct a "caper-comedy" called Lowlifes, about a housewife who "discovers she has a talent for burglary." That film, however, is nowhere to be found on his IMDb page. In its place are two dramas: New York Confidential, the Jason Itzer biopic we told you about last fall (though back then it was called Rocket Fuel for Winners), and a new one called Good Cook, Likes Music, about "a trailer-park slacker [who] sends away for a mail order bride -- a woman who turns out to be a musical prodigy who changes his life." Gotta love those mail order prodigies.

And now, in addition to those three projects, Production Weekly reported this morning that Wang is also going to direct a screen version of A Thousand Years of Good Prayers, a collection of stories by Yiyun Li "about life in modern China and the United States." The screenplay focuses on a Chinese man who travels to the Pacific Northwest to fix his relationship with his recently-divorced daughter. When the man arrives in the States, "he meets an older, Farsi-speaking Iranian woman. Even though they are total strangers, with the inability to communicate with a common language, they forge a bond with each other." Man, I'm such a sucker -- as cheesy as that sounds, I've been sucked in already. I bet there's going to be lots of pretty, fog-shrouded scenery, too.

If Production Weekly is to be trusted, from Wang's list of four (possible) projects, Good Prayers is going to be done first: It's expected to start shooting in Washington state this fall.

Wayne Wang's resume is really weird. On one hand, he's a respected, independent director who has given us little gems like Smoke, and the improvised Blue in the Face. On the other hand, he's the director of wildly successful, mainstream successes like The Joy Luck Club and Last Holiday. So far, so good, right? But hidden away in the resume are a couple of movies so bad they make you wonder if the good ones are just luck: ladies and gentlemen, Wayne Wang directed Maid in Manhattan. I know, I'd totally forgotten, too. He also made 1987's Slam Dance which, though no one has seen it but me, is one of those movies that's so weird and so terrible that it's actually fun to watch.

Wang's latest project, then, simply follows the totally unpredictable path his career has trod to this point: it's called Lowlifes, and is a "caper comedy." (What is a caper comedy, anyway? I haven't heard the word "caper" in about 40 years.) The screenplay, by first-timer Patty Sullivan, is about a housewife who "discovers she has a talent for burglary." So, based on what we've seen from Wang, Lowlifes is either going to be a laughable disaster or a triumph that leaves the whole world craving caper comedies. At this point, our guess is probably as good as his.

Just yesterday, James and I were talking about how ... interesting it is that Wayne Wang can go from directing a lo-fi sexual psychodrama like The Center of the World, and straight into fluffy quasi-empowerment rom coms, like Last Holiday, and the "J. Lo plus Ralph Fiennes equals Sabrina on Zoloft" shrug that was Maid in Manhattan. Wang's career um, arc? can be rationalized, James said, as a clear effort to balance art and commerce. Okay, but then what can we say of his Manhattan star, Jennifer Lopez? J. Lo famously broke out as Selena in Selena, and then built a reputation on strong work in left-of-center projects such as U-Turn and Steven Soderbergh's flawless Out of Sight. Then came the pop stardom, and the husbands, and a series of worthless films that failed to appeal to either film snobs or consumers. When you're failing to make either art OR commerce, shouldn't some kind of career re-evaluation take place?

Maybe, but acording to Variety, it's not going to happen any time soon. Greg Berlanti, creator of Everwood and former executive producer of Dawson's Creek, will direct Mrs. Mark Anthony in Bridge and Tunnel. Yet another deception-fueled romantic comedy, this one figures Lopez as a stocktrader who gets all of her moves from a teenager day trading from his home in the 'burbs. Though Variety doesn't specify much about the plot, I think it's safe to say that through this kid, J to the Lo finds both love, and the courage and confidence to do her job by her lonesome. From kick-ass Federal Marshall to waiting-to-exhale corporate fraud in just nine years? C'mon, Jenny – just give Taylor Hackford a couple mil and make the Carmen movie. For you, and for us.