Questions of Representation in Better Luck Tomorrow

    Margaret Hillenbrand's "Of Myths and Men" has many provocative quotes, but the final statement in reference to Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle is the one I'd like to examine more than any: "if Asian American cinema can be parodied alongside Sixteen Candles and The Simpsons, then surely-at last-it is on its way to arriving” (72). Hillenbrand is addressing a meta-joke in Harold in Kumar, in which a white bully tells John Cho's Harold "better luck tomorrow" in reference to his role in the Justin Lin film. 

    Does parody and/or canonization mean anything for representation or race relations on a larger scale? This is a difficult question. Simple representation may not change a bigot's view. For example, in Do the Right Thing, John Turturro's character is prejudiced against black people, but his favorite basketball player is Magic Johnson and his favorite actor is Eddie Murphy. He claims that he does not see these entertainers as black, they're "more than black", following the tradition of minstrel shows which played on black stereotypes for white audience's entertainment (examined further in Lee's Bamboozled). This applies to Asian-American representation, as bigots codify racial types into stereotypes from entertainment, such as Bruce Lee or Apu from The Simpsons. While these characters (and Magic Johnson and Eddie Murphy, for that matter) can and should be enjoyed by whoever wants to enjoy them, their mere existence in pop culture does not erase prejudice.

    Hillenbrand praises Harold and Kumar for its flippant attitude toward prejudice, citing (to paraphrase) the leads' authenticity and comfort as both integrated American citizens and leading men (70). Although it's been years since I've seen the film, this is certainly true. Cho and Penn make self-referential jokes about their race, but the film contains such a fast-paced and creative array of humor that their ethnicity certainly takes a backseat. Race is a presence in the film, and is ultimately essential to certain plot-lines, but it is far from overbearing. Harold and Kumar is canonized in pop culture, and I find it to be a testament to the positive abilities representation can have even though it's not the end-all-be-all. 

    I think that Better Luck Tomorrow is also ultimately beneficial for the Asian-American on-screen image. It is a solid genre film, hinting at issues of race and stereotype through subtext without heavy-handed commentary. It could have been a very similar film with different ethnicities in its cast. Maybe we read subtext into it that we would not have if it were a white film. Given marginalization of minorities, it is virtually impossible to make a Hollywood film with Asian-American stars without at least mentioning the topic of race. However, as Lin says, “People don't want to sit there to have you explain why you need to exist. You just do, and people have to come along with it” (54). While films that directly address racial issues need to exist, films such as Better Luck Tomorrow and Harold and Kumar need to exist for Asian-Americans to integrate fully on-screen.

    As pointed out in class, in Better Luck Tomorrow, it seems odd that we never see the main cast's parents. There are many jokes on the internet about the stereotype of Asian parents being overbearing (in particular with grades), and it feels almost intentional that no parents are shown in this film and the cast's academic motivations are expressed as self-interest. We feel the presence of parents, such as Steve's resentment toward his wealthy upbringing, and Virgil's fear of his father after a violent scene, which ultimately feels like a meta statement about his feigned masculinity. Perhaps the absence of parents can be chalked up to Hillenbrand's assertion that Lin "tread[s] carefully around the minefield of race relations for fear of looking too ethnic" (70). As a flip side to this, Kumar's character motivation in Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle (besides cheeseburgers) is to defy his overbearing father's desire for him to become a doctor. Where Better Luck Tomorrow dances around this stereotype, Harold and Kumar attacks it head-on.

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