The Wedding Banquet

The Wedding Banquet is a delightful, heartfelt remake of Ang Lee's 1993 classic that takes a beloved, time-honored premise and refreshes it for a new era. While the original film navigated issues of immigration, identity, and secrecy in a delicate blend of drama and comedy, this film shifts the focus toward relationships and personal growth, exploring the emotional depth of its characters with humor and sincerity.

The film's comedy, though undeniably lighthearted, works largely because the film is brisk, without sacrificing the emotional truth of the characters. The narrative unfolds at a fast pace, each twist and turn propelled by a charming, almost sitcom-like energy.

While the plot may feel predictable at times, and some of the situations bordering on farce, the direction allows the characters to shine through the chaos, striking a balance, using humor to gloss over some of the more contrived plot points, yet never losing sight of the genuine emotional moments at the film's heart.

The blend of comedy and sincerity is where the film truly excels. It never leans too heavily into one side, allowing for moments of deep emotional truth to coexist with the lighthearted absurdity of the characters' increasingly ridiculous plans. When the film slows down, the dialogue crackles with authenticity-especially during the quieter exchanges.

There is, however, a sense that the film could have pushed further into daring or edgier territory. It does not venture into particularly risky or provocative comedic waters. While this makes it a more accessible film for a broader audience, it also feels, at times, a little safe. In the era of modern streaming comedies and edgy narratives, a more bold exploration of the entanglements that ensue might have added another layer of excitement or complexity to the film.

Watched at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival.

I wasn't sure how a remake would work with And Lee's classic queer romantic comedy but color me surprise, the remake does a pretty good job on being creative from it's source material with new energy, humor, and atmosphere. Andrew Ahn is a director I have been keeping up with as his work Spa Night, Driveways and Fire Island have been pretty great and emotional engaging to observe. Here, Ahn's direction on the atmosphere, dialogue, and the character dynamics are pretty good. Being able to capture the emotions, hilarious dynamics, and some of the oddity and funny moments in both heartwarming and somewhat chaotic ways.

With a good presentation, all of the performances are great as many of the cast members are able to provide fun energy, personality and purpose to their characters. Bowen Yang particular stands out at his best. Narrative-wise, I do appreciate some new themes they were able to explore but there are some moments that felt a little uninspired with the concepts and dynamics that Ahn explores. Including how the production feels almost too fake like something from Netflix and some of the structure feels a little strange, which does make some moments a bit distracting and dragging a bit.

But overall, I didn't expect much for this remake but it was surprisingly not too bad and it went beyond the expectations.

"To thine own self be true" is more than just an oft-used platitude. It's also good advice, given that concocting and pulling off a scheme rooted in artifice is virtually assured to fail. Such is the case when a long-term gay male couple, Chris and Min (Bowen Yang, Han Gi-Chan, respectively), hatches what they believe to be an ingenious plan for carrying out a marriage of convenience involving their lesbian friends, Lee and Angela (Lily Gladstone, Kelly Marie Tran, respectively). In essence, Min, a South Korean national from a moneyed background whose US visa is about to expire, agrees to marry Angela so that he can qualify for a green card to stay stateside with Chris. In exchange, Min agrees to pay for the in vitro fertilization treatments that Lee is undergoing to enable her and Angela to have a child. It all sounds reasonable enough until Min's stern grandmother (Youn Yuh-jung), the no-nonsense controller of the family purse strings, who's thought to be unaware of her grandson's sexual orientation, decides to visit Seattle to meet Min's bride-to-be. But can the "couple" convince the aging matriarch that their upcoming betrothal is legitimate? Add to that additional complications involving Chris's reluctance to commit to Min for the long term, Angela's issues with her supportive but overbearing mother (Joan Chen) and questions about Lee's ability to successfully become pregnant, and the situation becomes a hot mess, one that threatens the security of two couples and their collective and individual plans for the future (hence the wisdom behind being truthful to oneself). Writer-director Andrew Ahn's latest feature, loosely based on filmmaker Ang Lee's 1993 release of the same name, is a touching, heartfelt romantic comedy-drama examining the kinds of challenges that same-sex couples often face in their relationships. In light of that, I must admit I was quite surprised by what turned up in the finished product, for several reasons. To begin with, the trailer for this film is very misleading, making the picture look like a campy, screwball LGBTQ+ comedy. Far from it; to be sure, the picture is far more serious and substantive than the preview lets on. But that ultimately works to the film's advantage, giving it an unexpected sense of depth that I definitely was not expecting. And that, in turn, helped to dispel the hesitation I had about wanting to screen this offering in the first place: To be honest, I was expecting to see a predictable, cliché-ridden story in the same vein as Ahn's previous feature, "Fire Island" (2022), which I despised because of all of its trite gay stereotypes, something I was not looking forward to seeing again. I'll freely admit that I was in error about that; thankfully, this film more closely resembles the artistic quality found in another of the director's previous works, "Driveways" (2020). What helps this release succeed so well are the fine performances of its excellent ensemble cast, including a break-out portrayal for Yang, who exhibits a greater range here than he's demonstrated in his previous roles, as well as the consistently solid turns by Chen, Yuh-jung and Gladstone. The film also employs humor in just the right amount, never becoming excessive nor falling prey to shopworn comedic devices, thanks to a capably penned script. "The Wedding Banquet" is truly a refreshingly unexpected treat, one of the better releases in the LGBTQ+ genre to have come out in some time. Indeed, this is one cinematic feast that's well worth your time.

Having been watching movies now for roughly 70 years, I relish finding something completely different from the usual fare. And hopefully also highly entertaining. This one meets those requirements, my wife and I found it unique and highly entertaining.

Also, with so many years of watching over 200 movies a year, I have noticed many times, a movie will start very well, get a bit muddled in the middle, and then doesn't know how to wrap everything up and arrive at a meaningful ending.

This one avoids that pitfall, it ends very nicely, in a very appropriate manner for the various characters and their situations.

The basic situation is this - two couples, one a female-female and the other a male-male, are good friends. In each case there are family impediments that make it hard to be their selves and live their best lives. That is part of the struggle.

Then, one of the guys, a Korean in the states for study, may outlive his visa and may need to return home, unless ... he can get married. But his partner is not ready for marriage.

The title of this movie would not be "Wedding Banquet" if there were no wedding, but what happens is a big diversion from where it was headed.

Anyway, we watched it at home on DVD from our public library. It is thoroughly entertaining with many laughs but also many meaningful adult themes.

Very surprised by all the positive reviews (both critics and movie-goers) of The Wedding Banquet.

My partner and I were very much looking forward to it - but were seriously disappointed.

Various reviewers described the film as hilarious, charming, heartwarming.

We did not see that movie.

It was like spending time - too much time - with neighbors who mostly converse in therapy-speak platitudes, irony-speak chatter and in the case of one of the characters, complain incessantly about their mother.

In addition to the annoying therapy-speak dialogue, the characters were not so interesting in our opinion. Angela's character (Kelly Marie Tran) was especially churlish and unappealing - it was impossible to see why Lee (Lily Gladstone) would have been in a relationship with Angela. For different reasons, it was difficult to see why Chris and Min were together.

The few interesting and thoughtful parts of the movie, in our opinion, were the scenes of Min and his grandmother.

I recall admiring the original Wedding Banquet - will watch it again to see.