After Yang

60

This is one that I’d been eyeing for a while. I do love a good sci-fi drama, and this seemed like it had that in spades. Turns out it does. A quiet, very literary type of drama. In fact, a very Kazuo Ishiguro tale, akin to a Never Let Me Go or, even more, Klara and the Sun. That novelistic approach where the dystopian sci-fi is interwoven with very human emotions and human conditions. It’s slow to the point of being meditative, which I suppose aligns with its Asian themes and Eastern philosophical approach. It’s insular and languid and I’m sure way smarter about whatever is going on than I can perceive because, despite watching tons of movies and reading lots of books, I’m often bad at perceiving esoteric connected texts. All I know is that, if I were Ishiguro, I might ask for a cut of what amounts to an incredibly paltry $675k box office, even for this low-budget film.

I do feel like we’re used to our sci-fi tales going big. Lots of noise. Lots of special effects. And, yes, our sci-fi futures are generally either decrepit and drippy or bright, shiny and antiseptic. After Yang takes a bit of a different approach, setting us in a world that feels incredibly familiar, but also slightly askew. And purposely vague. Mostly because we have one Irish parent, Jake (Colin Farrell), one British parent, Kyra (Jodie Turner-Smith), and one adopted Chinese daughter with an American accent. Who all live in a very mid-century modern Asian-styled suburban community in what is almost definitely New York state just north of Manhattan. While they never really say where in the US or the world this takes place, I’ll have to assume the U.S. since even the family robot, Yang (Justin H. Min), has an American accent. Whatever the location, it’s purposely murky so as to give it a global-future feel. Maybe a dystopian diaspora where this couple makes sense.

Because Kyra and her high-powered corporate gig being married to this mush of a man who runs what feels like a pretty poorly manned, dying tea shop just doesn’t feel right. And perhaps this is the intentional tension in their relationship and why they seemingly shuttle their parental responsibilities to their robot nanny, Yang. In fact, everyone in the family seems to be floating around in their own universe; the stereotypical ships passing in the night. I’m not certain if Jake’s excuse that he “spends a lot of time at the tea store” is because he needs to. It feels more like he spends a lot of time at the tea store because that’s where his wife is not. Nor are customers, frankly. The place looks like a combination of Mr. Wing’s antique shop in Gremlins and the smoke monster’s cave from Lost. Also funny is that once Yang breaks down and Jake makes it his mission to figure out a way to bring him back to “life,” he never visits his tea shop ever again. Or at least we never see him go there. Maybe they only had one shoot day in that weird space. Or perhaps his excuse of hanging out in his terrible business was just supplanted by running around trying to save his daughter’s robot babysitter. Excuse meet excuse. Whatever the case, I was not feeling the chemistry between Farrell and Smith-Turner at all. Which was probably intentional, but was something I kind of wanted to see and understand a bit more to make their eventual understanding feel more earned.

In case you haven’t guessed, the crux of the drama here is the loss of Yang. And what happens afterward. The title kinda says it all. Yang was purchased to teach Jake and Kyra’s daughter, Mika, about her Chinese heritage. In theory he is just packed with Chinese facts that he can pass along to Mika so she feels a connection to her country of birth. And to babysit her, of course, while her parents are working and/or generally wandering around the house quietly avoiding each other. We pretty much start the film with Yang on the verge of shutdown. Mika is upset, and it falls upon Jake to figure out how to save him. He is, of course, a machine. A very realistic one, but comes with the whole issue of warranties and the fact they bought him refurbished by a third-party seller… Honestly, though, none of this matters. It just needs to lead us to a discovery that Yang’s memory bank inside his dead body contains a secret mechanism that essentially allowed him to record little daily snippets of video (through his own eyes), to document what he felt were the most important moments of the day. And when Jake gains access to this data and is able to jump around in this webbed universe of video clips using some tech-y John Lennon glasses, he gets to see it all. His exposure to these clips, and his immersion in Yang’s very beautiful perception of the important moments, unlocks his understanding of Yang’s humanity and the very human life he lived both with his Mika and beyond. He wasn’t just the robot nanny!

But, of course, even more than uncovering the mystery of Yang’s life is the growing appreciation he starts to have for being in the moment and how special his relationship with his daughter and wife can be. It’s all presented in these small, lovely clips. Yang mostly in nature, appreciating a sunset or a bug or a leaf. Often it’s a conversation with Mika, and even some clips about he and Jake talking about tea or teaching Kyra about some Chinese philosophy. Again, it’s a very quiet movie. Very slow moving. Very artsy in its construction. But rather pretty and deeply thoughtful. Everyone understands the assignment. You are not the film, the film is the film. And in that I can appreciate the film as a piece of art. There is somewhat of a mystery, but it’s pretty tepid. There is definitely no bad guy. There are no ships or lasers or anything other than a family drama set in a sci-fi context. And sometimes, when the vibes are as authentic and interesting as these, that’s just fine.