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‘Joy Ride’ Review: Outrageous Asian ‘Girls Trip’ Gives Fresh Foursome a Chance to Cut Loose

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5 days ago

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In 1993, “The Joy Luck Club” made Hollywood history, proving to a skeptical — and let’s face it, racist — industry that there was mainstream demand for a culturally sensitive Chinese American ensemble drama. Three decades later, along comes “Joy Ride,” throwing sensitivity to the wind en route to obliterating any remaining barriers. Like “Girls Trip” with an all-Asian-American cast, the Seth Rogen-produced, hard-R road movie follows small-town besties Audrey (Ashley Park) and Lolo (Sherry Cola) to Beijing, where they tackle everything from taboo tattoos to a devil’s threesome with all the gusto you’d hope or expect from “Crazy Rich Asians” co-writer Adele Lim’s directorial debut.

Frankly, it should be no shock that Asian American comics can be every bit as filthy and wrong as their white-guy counterparts. Heck, it’s practically expected of them. From Margaret Cho to Ali Wong to Awkwafina, there’s no shortage of “Crazy Raunchy Asians” in the stand-up community, and let’s not forget that of all the wild gags the “Hangover” movies had to offer, the series’ MVP was none other than Ken Jeong. So, while “Joy Ride” may be a barrier-breaker, this moment is so long overdue, we can’t help but wonder what took them so long to put such a team together to see what kind of mischief they could come up with.

“Joy Ride” wastes no time in setting the tone, opening with a flashback to that special moment 25 years earlier when adopted Audrey and new-to-town Lolo cemented their friendship: The two girls have just met at the aptly named White Hills Park when a bully hurls a racist insult across the playground. “Fuck you!” Lolo screams back, punching the kid so hard he’ll probably need stitches. At the movie’s SXSW premiere (where Lionsgate treated the already-rowdy crowd to free alcohol), the auditorium erupted into applause at that moment, which is undeniably empowering — and arguably even necessary, considering the recent spike in hate crimes against Asian Americans.

For sitcom-honed co-writers Cherry Chevapravatdumrong and Teresa Hsiao, the trick is to keep surprising audiences with just how far they’re willing to push any given scenario. Meanwhile, for the central foursome — which also includes stand-up Sabrina Wu (as Lolo’s friendless cousin Deadeye) and “Everything Everywhere All at Once” star Stephanie Hsu (as Audrey’s former college roommate Kat) — the idea is to take each situation and juice it up even further with ad libs and alt lines.

The movie may not be “Bridesmaids”-level brilliant, but it’s got more than a couple hall-of-fame-worthy comedy set-pieces, like the memorable-enough K-pop cover of Cardi B’s “WAP,” which one-ups itself with an unforgettable reveal. What “Joy Ride” doesn’t have is a particularly strong storyline on which to hang all its how-low-can-you-go shenanigans.

An overachieving associate in an otherwise all-white law firm, Audrey — who was raised by white parents, played by David Denman and Annie Mumolo, and knows hardly anything of her Asian heritage — accepts an assignment to fly to Beijing and seal the deal with an important Chinese client. She invites Lolo along to serve as translator, disregarding the fact that her friend (a “body positive artist” who finds a way to bring most conversations around to sex) has a tendency to say and do outrageously inappropriate things in public.

“Joy Ride” recognizes that women — and especially women of color — have it tough in the workplace, where they aren’t treated as equals and are frequently objectified by their peers. But if the movie’s being political about anything, it’s beating the by-now-obvious point that such-and-such demographic can be just as extreme as so-and-so Seth Rogen movie. With that goal in mind, “Joy Ride” features more irreverent vagina monologues than “Sausage Party” did dick jokes, which is a surely an accomplishment of some kind.

At the end of the day, what matters is how funny it is, and if you strip away the alcohol-primed SXSW audience’s laugh-at-everything response, a lot of “Joy Ride’s” humor hinges on characters shouting insults (“You look like Hello Kitty just got skull-fucked by Keropi!”) or unapologetic ethnic stereotypes (presumably excused by the source). Wu adds an element of physical comedy to the mix, functioning as the movie’s go-to scene-stealer, the way Melissa McCarthy did in “Bridesmaids,” or Awkwafina in “Crazy Rich Asians.”

The script does a decent job of spreading the laughs between the four core characters, while giving them all something to do in key scenes — whether it’s the cross-country train ride which turns into a desperate scramble to ingest or otherwise conceal a ton of drugs before the Chinese police find them, or an ambitious montage in which each of the women gets lucky with one or more members of the Chinese Basketball Association.

The latter proves inconvenient for Hsu’s character, Kat, a rising film and TV star engaged to be married to ultra-religious Chinese actor Clarence (Desmond Chiam). While Kat’s allowed her celebrity fiancé to believe that she’s a virgin, conversations between the four women suggest that she racked up enough conquests to rival Annabel Chong — to name just one more celebrity giving lie to the notion that Asians are de facto more demure than Seth Rogen and his buddies.

An explicit twist involving Kat’s character gets the film’s biggest laughs, humiliating everyone and turning the four friends against one another, though the otherwise satisfying script stumbles through the inevitable fall-out and make-up scenes. A year-later epilogue set on an altogether different continent doesn’t quite work and probably should’ve been saved for the sequel, which feels all but inevitable, since there can be little doubt that Lionsgate has a hit on its hands.



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TCM Sets Warner Bros. 100th Anniversary Program Slate Including 10 Restored Classic Films

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8 hours ago

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March 22, 2023

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Warner Bros. will commemorate its 100th anniversary with a block of programming on Turner Classic Movies starting April 1.

TCM will broadcast remastered and newly restored versions of 10 classic Warner Bros. films, each featuring an introduction from a filmmaker or film expert culled from the network’s ongoing partnership with the Film Foundation, a non-profit preservation and exhibition organization. The program coincides with the April 13-16 run of the TCM Classic Film Festival in Hollywood.

On April 13, a new 4K restoration of 1959’s “Rio Bravo,” Howard Hawks’ classic western starring John Wayne, Dean Martin, Ricky Nelson and Angie Dickinson, will premiere on TCM and serve as the opening night film of the festival. Dickinson will attend the in-person event, while Martin Scorsese will introduce the film on TCM’s small-screen presentation. Similarly, Warner Bros. will premiere a new 4K restoration of Elia Kazan’s “East of Eden,” starring James Dean, on both the big screen and the network, the latter featuring an introduction by filmmakers Wes Anderson and Joanna Hogg.

Other films planned for broadcast on TCM include “Land of the Pharaohs” and “Storm Warning” (both introduced by Scorsese), “Rachel, Rachel” (introduced by Ethan Hawke), “Safe in Hell” (by Alexander Payne), and “A Lion is in the Streets,” introduced by Daphne Dentz and Robyn Sklaren of the Warner Bros. Discovery Library.

TCM additionally plans to program trailers, archival interviews, documentaries and other ephemera from Warner Bros., complementing festival programs such as “Looney Tunes at the Oscars” and “Warner Bros. Coming Attractions,” panels exploring the studio’s extensive history.



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Jeff Goldblum Addresses His Jurassic Park Costar’s Cancer Diagnosis

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9 hours ago

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March 22, 2023

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Jurassic Park star Jeff Goldblum has addressed his costar Sam Neill’s diagnosis of stage 3 blood cancer. Goldblum portrayed mathematician Dr. Ian Macolm in the first Jurassic Park film opposite Neill’s paleontologist Dr. Alan Grant. He returned to his role as Ian in The Lost World: Jurassic Park and in Jurassic World: Dominion, the latter of which saw him reunite with Neill in the franchise for the first time since Spielberg’s original film.


Speaking with Evening Standard, Goldblum opened up about Neill’s diagnosis of stage 3 blood cancer, which the Jurassic Park actor revealed in his recent autobiography. He quietly spoke about Neill’s remission, hopeful that the actor would recover soon. Read what Goldblum had to say below:

SCREENRANT VIDEO OF THE DAY

“He shared it with us early on. He’s been in constant touch with me and, well, he looks fantastic, he sounds great. Hopefully, he’s as healthy as a horse now. I just adore him.”


How Jeff Goldblum & Sam Neill’s Jurassic Park Roles Defined Them

Having starred in Jurassic Park in 1993, Goldblum and Neill have continued to be friends since taking their roles in the dinosaur franchise. During the production of Jurassic World: Dominion and while dealing with the Covid pandemic, the duo began singing and posting cover songs online. The pair are good friends, which makes Goldblum’s well wishes for Neill’s recovery process all the more heartwarming.

Goldblum and Neill are also the only actors whose Jurassic Park characters visited Isla Sorna on the big screen. Ian Malcolm went to Site B in The Lost World: Jurassic Park to document the dinosaurs, while Alan Grant visited the island in Jurassic Park III after being hired to find a lost boy. Their return in subsequent Jurassic Park sequels underscores their roles as the heart of the franchise, made all the more prominent because of their reunion in Jurassic World: Dominion.

Thankfully, Neill’s cancer has been in remission for the last eight months, indicating the treatment he went through has been working to save his life. The talented actor is already filming a new project as well, having reassured his fans in an Instagram post earlier this week that he is doing well. Goldblum’s concern for his friend is one of many well wishes the Jurassic Park star has received as he continues to recover from his diagnosis.

Source: Evening Standard

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Vanessa Hudgens Sets Philippines Travel Documentary Exploring Her Family’s Asian Heritage

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20 hours ago

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March 22, 2023

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Vanessa Hudgens, the Asian American actor whose career kicked off in Disney’s “High School Musical” series, is set to shoot a travel documentary in the Philippines, the country of her mother’s birth.

The untitled project will shoot in Palawan and Manila in March. Paul Soriano is attached as a director, producer and executive producer. Mark A. Victor of TEN17P will also serve as executive producer. No distributor, broadcaster or streaming platform has yet been disclosed.

Soriano’s recent credits include directing the 2019 film “Mañanita” and Manny Pacquiao biopic “Kid Kulafu.”

The documentary is said to showcase the relationship between Hudgens and her Filipino mother, Gina, who emigrated to the U.S. at the age of 25, as well as Hudgens’ sister, Stella.

Since “High School Musical,” Hudgens has notched up key roles in “Spring Breakers”, “Gimme Shelter,” “Bad Boys for Life,” and the Oscar-nominated Lin-Manuel Miranda-directed musical “Tick, Tick …Boom!” Hudgens executive produced and starred in the film “The Knight Before Christmas” and all three installments of “The Princess Switch” series for Netflix. Hudgens is next set to star in the upcoming films “French Girl” and “Bad Boys 4.”

“I feel like ours is such a relatable story to so many women all over the world,” Hudgens said in a statement announcing the documentary. “The more that we can share, the more we can lift each other up.”

“We are honored to work with Vanessa for this film project. It’s inspiring to note that with everything she has achieved in life, she wants to discover her Filipino roots and pay homage to her mother’s country. Hopefully, this opens doors for many more collaborations to come,” said Soriano in a statement.

Soriano previously produced “A Lullaby to the Sorrowful Mystery” (2016), which won a special film award at the Berlin International Film Festival, and “Transit” in 2013, which was selected as the Philippines’ entry for the foreign language film category at the Academy Awards. He is also a presidential creative adviser to the Philippines’ government.

Hudgens is repped by CAA, Untitled Entertainment, the Lede Company and Ziffren Brittenham.



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