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This ‘Crazy Rich Asians’ Twitter thread has the internet sobbing

Here’s why the film means so much to this writer.

Photo of Josh Katzowitz

Josh Katzowitz

Crazy Rich Asians impact

The Crazy Rich Asians movie has wowed the Hollywood establishment with its 92 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes and with its expected box-office riches.

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It’s also had quite an impact on Asian writers. The Daily Dot’s Kristina Nguyen wrote about the sense of relief she felt when “a movie that you’re rooting for, that means so much to the Asian American community, sticks the landing,” and the movie’s director Jon Chu has talked about how it took him a long time to “explore my cultural identity … because it was such a sensitive part of my heart and my soul.”

On Friday night, Kimberly Yam—the Asian Voices editor for the Huffington Post—posted a Twitter thread in which she explained why the film meant so much to her.

She takes readers on a journey from when she was in third grade and was made to feel ashamed to be Chinese to today when, 17 years later, Crazy Rich Asians gave her a sense of pride about her heritage. And her Twitter thread had the internet in tears.

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Here’s how Twitter responded.

https://twitter.com/buckscience/status/1030648448935251968

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That kind of Twitter confession likely would mean plenty to Constance Wu, who stars in the movie and who shared her feelings about what the film meant to her.

She said she never dreamed she’d get to star in a studio film, because “I had never seen that happen to somebody who looks like me.” She also credited Chu with giving her inspiration with his suggestion that “this is more than a movie, it’s a movement.”

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As Wu wrote in a recent letter, “I hope Asian American kids watch CRA and realize that they can be the heroes of their own stories.” Or, in the case of Yam, give them a reason to be proud of who they are and where they came from.

 
The Daily Dot