The Mothers:
Suyuan: Kieu Chinh
Lindo: Tsai Chin
Ying Ying: France Nuyen
An Mei: Lisa Lu
The Daughters:
June: Ming-Na Wen
Waverly: Tamlyn Tomita
Lena: Lauren Tom
Rose: Rosalind Chao
“The Joy Luck Club” comes rushing off the screen in a torrent of memories, as if its characters have been saving their stories for years, waiting for the right moment to share them. That moment comes after a death and a reunion that bring the past back in all of its power, and show how the present, too, is affected – how children who think they are so very different are deeply affected by the experiences of their parents.
The movie, based on Amy Tan’s 1989 best-selling novel, tells the story of four women who were born in China and eventually came to America, and of their daughters. Around these eight women circle innumerable friends and relatives, both there and here, Chinese and not, in widening circles of experience. What is about to be forgotten are the origins of the women, the stories of how they were born and grew up in a time and culture so very different from the one they now inhabit.
The “Joy Luck Club” of the title is a group of four older Chinese ladies who meet once a week to play mah jong, and compare stories of their families and grandchildren. All have made harrowing journeys from pre-revolutionary China to the comfortable homes in San Francisco where they meet. But those old days are not often spoken about, and sometimes the whole truth of them is not known.
The Essay on The Yellow Wallpaper Story Woman John
... John, Jennie and the narrator. The theme of this story is a woman's fall into insanity resulting from isolation from treatment ... of post-partum depression. Gilman is also telling the story of how women were thought of as prisoners by the demands ... including the color and the patterns. However, as the story continues, the woman's attitude changes toward the wallpaper. Through given belittling comments, ...
June (Ming-Na Wen), the narrator, is the daughter of one of the women, Suyuan (Kieu Chinh).
After her mother’s death, she decides to take a trip to China, to meet for the first time two half-sisters who still live there. The movie opens at a farewell party, and then, in a series of flashbacks, tells the secrets and stories of all four of the “aunties.” In a screenplay remarkable for its complexity and force, “The Joy Luck Club” moves effortlessly between past and present, between what was, and how it became what is. Many different actresses are used to play the daughters and mothers at different ages, and there are many stories, but the movie proceeds with perfect clarity.
We see that the China of the 1930s and 1940s, before the Revolution, was an unimaginably different place than it is today.
Women were not valued very highly. Those with independent minds and spirits were valued even less than the docile, obedient ones. Life was cheap, especially in wartime. A mother’s ability to care for her children was precarious. In many cases, issues from those hard days still affect later generations: The ability of the mothers to relate to their daughters depends on things that have never been said out loud.
How, for example, could June’s mother have told of abandoning her first-born twin girls by the roadside? Suyuan, starving and sick, was sure she should die, and felt her girls would have a better chance of survival if they were not linked to the “bad luck” of a dead mother.
Other stories fall equally hard on Americanized ears. There is the auntie who became the fourth wife of a rich man, and when she bore him the son he desired so much, the boy child was taken from her by the second wife. There are humorous stories, too, including the auntie who prayed before her arranged marriage for a husband “not too old,” and got a 10-year-old boy (“Maybe I prayed too hard!”).
In America, the mothers find it hard to understand the directions their daughters are taking. Some marry whites, who have bad table manners. They move out of the old neighborhood into houses that seem too modern and cold. One daughter despairs of ever satisfying her mother, who criticizes everything she does.
The Term Paper on Joy Luck Club 7
... tears. The Joy Luck Club is a novel telling the stories trails and tribulations of four women and their daughters united by Joy luck.Joy Luck is a ... to consider. A.The jade pendent June received from her mother represents her mothers love. She will never understand the reasons behind that ...
These stories are about Chinese and Chinese-American characters, but they are universal stories. Anyone with parents or children, which is to say, everyone, will identify with the way that the hopes of one generation can become both the restraints and the inspirations of the next.
The movie is a celebration, too, of the richness of Asian-American acting talent; all of the performers here have appeared in many other films and plays, and I could list their credits, from the old days of “South Pacific” and “The World of Susie Wong” to recent films like “A Thousand Pieces of Gold” and “Come See the Paradise.” But often they were marginalized, or used in “exotic” roles, or placed in stories that were based on what made them different from the dominant culture, instead of what makes them human and universal. “The Joy Luck Club” is like a flowering of talent that has been waiting so long to be celebrated. It is also one of the most touching and moving of the year’s films.
The Joy Luck Club, as stated in the movie’s opening narrative, is a collection of four aging Chinese women bound together more by hope than joy or luck. The four women – Suyuan (Kieu Chinh), Lindo (Tsai Chin), Ying Ying (France Nuyen), and An Mei (Lisa Lu) – came to America many years ago to escape China’s feudal society for the promise of the United States’ democracy. Now, however, Suyuan has died and the three surviving members of the club invite her daughter June (Ming-Na Wen) to take her place. June belongs to the “new” generation, those of Chinese heritage who grew up speaking English and learning American customs. Also of roughly the same age are Waverly (Tamlyn Tomita), Lindo’s daughter; Lena (Lauren Tom), Ying Ying’s daughter; and Rose (Rosalind Chao), An Mei’s daughter. The Joy Luck Club tells of the varied difficulties and tragedies involved in these mother/daughter relationships.
Co-writer Ronald Bass (who, along with Amy Tan, adapted from Tan’s novel) says that there are sixteen separate stories in The Joy Luck Club. Since I didn’t count, I can’t verify this statement, but it sounds about right. Taken as a whole, these vignettes combine to lend greater meaning to the whole. The Joy Luck Club is the sum total of its parts with common themes giving solid grounding and greater resonance to the overall film. As Bass comments, “I saw all the mothers’ and daughters’ stories as facets of the same experience. Put together, they formed a mosaic. That’s the genius of the book, and if we cut it down to just a couple of stories it would be like any other movie.”
The Essay on Joy Luck Club 9
Literary Analysis : An-Mei Hsu v.s. Rose Hsu Jordan Every mother should want to make life easier for their child. This is shown in Amy Tans novel, The Joy Luck Club. It consists of stories about the lives and relationships between the mothers and daughters of the Joy Luck Club. An-Mei Hsu is always trying to help her daughter, Rose Hsu Jordan, through the difficulties of life. Roses biggest ...
The stories are not related in such a manner as to seem pared down or truncated, nor is their presentation confusing, thanks to a cleverly-orchestrated framing scene with the principal characters gathered together. However, it is apparent that a lot more could have been told, and we’re left wondering about all that we didn’t get to see. The characters are mostly well-developed, but it’s tantalizing to consider how much fuller some of them could have been with a different plot structure.
The Joy Luck Club is clearly – perhaps too clearly – an adaptation of a book. The dialogue is often too poetic to be real, and the story too clearly plotted to be acceptable as anything more than an imperfect reflection of the world we live in. The line between drama and melodrama is a fine one, and, while The Joy Luck Club most often successfully navigates the tightrope, there are times when it slips and comes across as heavy-handed. This film is no stranger to moments of manipulation.
The characters are The Joy Luck Club’s real strength. Many are played by more than one actor (as children then adults, for example), but all transitions are smooth and seamless. It’s as easy to accept both a little girl and the beautiful, sophisticated-looking Tamlyn Tomita as Waverly, and that’s because the characters transcend the performers portraying them.
It’s fascinating and satisfying the way the diverse threads are knitted together into a single tapestry. The Joy Luck Club’s message is one of hope — that catharsis and emotional fulfillment often come through tragedy. Sure, a lot of bad things happen during the course of this film, but at the end, the tears are of happiness and new beginnings, not loss.
“The Joy Luck Club” is a ground-breaking film with universal themes that anyone can relate to regardless of age, gender or nationality. Truly epic in its scope and haunting vision, the movie is also deeply heartfelt and familial, enhancing its ability to speak to the audience in myriad, boundless ways. This is an intimate portrait of two generations of Asian women – the mothers who risked everything to create a better life for their daughters in the United States. At this juncture in American history, the movie resonates more than ever by reminding the viewer of our fore-mother’s immigrant experience. In doing so, “The Joy Luck Club” serves as a vibrant contemporary document on freedom and the pursuit of happiness.
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Julia Alvarez’s novel “In the Name of Salome” weaves together the life and spirit of Salome Urena, and her daughter, Salome Camila, through a journey of political turbulence in the Dominican Republic. Throughout her life, Salome describes the chaotic days of rebellions and the calmness of transitory peace between political powers. The book trails the history of the Dominican ...
Ming-Na Wen (now known to millions as Ming-Na or Deb Chen on NBC’s top rated drama “ER”) is superb in the central role of June, greiving for her recently deceased mother with the 3 “aunties” who miantain her place at the mah-jon table. Their gatherings continue, with June’s presence, and in the process form the backdrop from which these women’s personal stories and life-journies are shared. Each auntie – and their now-adult Americanized daughters – explain their often-harrowing attempt to escape Communist China and their difficult transition to an American way of life in the U.S. Tears flow in both generations, not only for what has been lost, but also for what has been found here – a society with different values that challenges these women in unexpected but nearly universal ways. As both generations – and all eight women eventually – share their stories, the viewer literaly steps into each life, aware of where the characters end up, yet fully experiencing the challenges each of them faces. Set against the backdrop of June’s trip to China to find her long-lost sisters (whom her mother was forced to leave behind in one of the film’s most powerful sub-plots) “The JOy Luck Club” can be ANY family’s story, regardless of how long they or their ancestors have lived in this country.
In doing so, it succeeds at building bridges to the past, while staunchly looking ahead to the future. This is the sort of film that embraces real life and human themes, but also puts a face on what it means to be a zero-generation immigrant, or an exile in a land far from one’s home and culture. Like the current spate of Latin and Soviet block immigrants and the last century’s explosion of new Americans from Europe and Africa, we recognize through the characters the meaning and value of freedom, family and peace as well as the unimaginable challenges our elders faced in coming to this land of opportunity.
The Term Paper on Mothers And Daughters
Mothers and Daughters, A Lifelong Relationship. The relationship between mothers and daughters affects women strongly at all stages of their lives. Even though not all women become mothers, all are obviously daughters, and daughters have mothers. Even daughters who never become mothers must counter the issues of motherhood, because the possibility and even the probability of motherhood remains. ...
The cast of Asian-American actresses is uniformly superb, straddling a delicate balance for the viewer that requires they be both accessible AND remote at once. Although long seen as a “woman’s movie” the film deserves to be widely experienced by all people, including men, who might otherwise reject the film as nothing more than handkerchief fluff. In fact, since few similar films exist with central male characters, “The Joy Luck Club” stands as a film I believe many men would embrace if they give it a chance. The film speaks for our fathers and brothers, not just our sisters, mothers or wives. This is grand, epic storytelling with a heart, beautifully directed by Wayne Wang and amazingly accessible in every way, due to its stellar cast. Had there been a Best Ensemble Oscar designed to honor the contribution of a group of actors at the top of their form, “The Joy Luck Club” cast would have surely been honored.
A magnificent film that fully captures what it means to be an American of any descent.
Having not seen it since it was in the theater, I forgot just how good “The Joy Luck Club” is. The story of each of the women is personal and engaging. Different lives and pasts leading to the same destination, each road is harsh and lined with perils. The film is a nice blend of period piece and modern drama.
I love the dialog (“She will know I am waiting like a tiger in the trees, now ready to leap out and cut her spirit loose.”) Visually, the film is almost too pretty. The women are all heart-breakingly beautiful, and each setting is dream-like in it’s perfection. However, what could be a flaw is a strength, due largely to the quality of the actors. Each of the characters is strong and individual.
It is a very touching story of mothers and daughters, of hopes and fears. One of my favorite character actors, Victor Wong, even has a small part. A good film all around.
This tearjerker adaptation based on the book by Amy Tan, is about four Chinese mothers and their American born daughters, and how the distinct cultural chasm in their upbringing, play into their daily lives.
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A Christmas Story is an American Christmas comedy classic film that has been shown on television for many years ever since it was produced in 1983. This classic holiday film is shown every year during the Christmas season and is shown in a 24 hour marathon. Many families watch this film over and over every year during the Christmas season as if it was new film. There are several technical and ...
The flashbacks into the young lives of each mother is masterful storytelling filled with rich imagery.
But it is the everyday struggles of modern life with their daughters and the conflicts between them that most will easily recognize. In this way the movie does not exclude the general viewer from identifying with their own personal relationships with their mother, spouse, or friends.
This is one of the best technically engineered movies I have ever seen. The way in which the lives of the characters are weaved together is nothing short of genuis, and the movie slides flawlessly from the present to the past and back to the present again
The story of each mother’s youth is both heartbreaking and wonderful at the same time, and with their somewhat broken english offer up an amazing amount of simple yet profound statements and insights as they tell their story and try to impart upon their daughters wisdom gained through both suffering and sacrifice.
The modern day entanglements of each daughter and their often tense relationships with their moms, show us in the end that no matter who we are, or where we come from, the bond between a mother and daughter is often a complex enigma, full of conflicting emotions.
Throughout all this, the main underlying issue is the trip to China one of the daughters is about to embark on, to meet for the first time, two sisters previously abandoned in wartime China while at the same time paying a personal tribute to her own mother.
If I had to flaw the movie it would be the constant onslaught on one?s emotions right up until the very end.
Nevertheless, I still give it 5 stars although I am sure this movie will appeal more to women.
FAVORITES MOVIE QUOTES:
“..and on that day, second wife’s hair began to turn white”
“All around me I see the signs. My daughter looks but does not see. This is a house that will break into pieces”
“But Lena had no spirit, ..because I had none to give her”
“I like being tragic mom… I learned it from you”
I saw this movie when I was in high school and although I never understood what it was that was stirring inside me, over the years I kept trying to watch the film. As I have gotten older and immigrated from Asia to the US, my life was turned upside down from the changes and the new culture I was placed in the midst of. It took a while for me to find my place in my new life, and land with my feet planted on the ground. But the stories of these women I finally understood because it was mine too.
Amy Tan has represented the strengths, weaknesses, and struggles of many Asian women in such a clear and bold way. How traditions, cultures, and environment play such a vital role in our lives that shape what we think and who we become. I am so thankful she wrote this book and thankful that they made a film of it.
I love the dynamics in each mother-daughter relationship and the history from each one. This movie always makes me cry and reflect on the relationship with my own mother and heritage.
The movie depicted the Asian man as a guy who always wants the wife to pay half of the money. In reality, I see more women trying to use men’s hoping to be a gentleman to make him pay for this and that, and to get away with things she did that was bad.
Another thing is that the movie depicted Asian men as bad guys. But in reality, I found that Asian men tend to be the “nice guys”. And in fact, too nice that it became “nice guys finish last”.
So this movie just uglify Asian Men. The truth is, if you want to uglify anything, you can successfully do it. If you uglify with humor, at least people know it is just for making fun of somebody. If you uglify and make it look like a reality, then it is not so good.
Lovely, tender, funny, heartrending.
Many themes, but one most central is the immigrant experience — the tensions between immigrants with “old country” values, and their US-born children with US values.
And about a favorite relationship: mother-daughter.
Amy Tan wrote a wonderful essay, “Mother Tongue,” perhaps still available online (search for “amy tan mother tongue”) in which she works through her childhood embarrassment, shame, and pain over her mother’s “broken English,” and at seeing her mother’s victimization, and shame, for having “broken English”. She finally realizes that it isn’t “broken”; it’s stripped to essence:
“You best quality heart. Must be born this way.”
I found this a wonderful visual movie and a great venue for Chinese-American actresses, all of whom I found fascinating to watch.
With eight stories woven into this two hour, 19 minute movie. I think it would be understandable if many first-time viewers get a little confused if you don’t know the stories or the actors. It also got a little soap-opera-ish, too, but then again, this film was based on a best-selling book that was read primarily by women.
On the second viewing, almost two years later, I liked it a lot more and upgraded my “star” rating considerably. It’s still a “chick flick” and a feminist one. The young women are that way, the Americanized women, while their mothers, those all born in China, are quite traditional. The older ladies are a bit too strict and their daughters are a bit too liberal. That included general morals and language – a big difference between the two generations and cultures. The feminist angle I didn’t like was that in almost every relationship the man is painted as the bad guy (the abuser, the non-loving type, etc.) That kind of story bias was too much.
For me, the best part of the film was the cinematography. There were some beautiful scenes and great colors: bright oranges, yellows, reds and browns. Some of the young women were beautiful, too. The lady narrating in the beginning, “June” (Melanie Chang as a nine-year-old and then Ming-Na as an adult) was very appealing and had a great voice. Her story is the one that begins and ends the film. That ending, by the way, is almost guaranteed to bring a few tears.
If you have read the book, you will appreciate the fact that Amy Tan helped in writing the screenplay. The film is very true to the book with a few bits left out but the heart and spirit of the story was successfully captured in the film version. It probes deeply into the heart of the mother-daughter dynamic and, no matter where your roots are, where you are from or where you grew up, there is a common theme that I believe every woman can relate to which are those hopes and expectations that a mother has for her daughter. Sometimes these hopes and expectations are outside of what the daughter wants or perceives for herself but what is needed is understanding of each other to bridge the gap. This film is a profound story about women and their daughters who have bridged that gap, cultural and experiential, and the journey they went through to do so. Heart-wrenching and heart-warming at the same time. Beautifully done!
For the cinematography and the superb acting, this film deserves five stars and more. I did not give it five stars because it is such an emotional roller coaster ride that it is hard to watch – even though I have watched it several times! Joy Luck Club is a masterpiece of storytelling the way that a film should be!
“The Joy Luck Club” is an interesting movie. Like an assortment of dim sum, there are many flavors. It tells of four Chinese women who emigrate to the United States and the experiences of their daughters. It was produced by Oliver Stone, astoundingly, and directed by Wayne Wang at the beginning of his career. June (Ming-Na) is mourning the death of her mother,Suyuan,only to learn that she has half-sisters in China because of WWII. June now heads the Joy Luck Club,a gathering of women playing mah jong.
There are several entwined stories. An-Mei Hsu’s mother was a concubine,a fourth wife who committed suicide to save her children. An-Mei’s daughter, Rose,is now in the midst of a painful divorce. Lindo claims that another member of her household has a “spiritual pregnancy” by her husband to escape a sexless arranged marriage. Ying-Ying “Betty” St. Clair drowns her infant son in the movie to get back at her abusive husband; however, in the novel, it was an abortion. Wang’s timidity in tackling the subject of abortion is a contrast to his recent Internet movie, “Princess of Nebraska”,in which a teenaged girl from China comes to the US for an abortion and tries to keep her family in the dark. The mothers’ problems come down to their daughters. Lindo is especially cruel, enjoying her daughter Waverly’s tears. Lena is married to a wimpy husband who insists on equality, but is deeply unhappy.
“Joy Luck Club” has deeply human stories at its heart. It’s about generational conflict, the power of family, the immigrant experience, and Chinese culture. It’s beautifully done. San Francisco, the City by the Bay, becomes a convergence of East and West. There’s joy and sorrow. It’s bittersweet. Like a Chinese garden, it is intricate and for contemplation.
Second part
Amy Tan’s readers luxuriated in the wealth of stories she coaxed forth from the Joy Luck Club, a group of dedicated Chinese-American mah-jongg players whose present-day serenity belied their tumultuous early years. Each of these women had searing, highly dramatic memories of her Chinese girlhood; each encountered a different sort of trouble in trying to bring up her own offspring on American soil. Each recalled the events of her life in lavish and exotic detail, and those events had a way of teaching lessons. The parallels that linked the novel’s parents and children provided it with a source of foolproof wisdom.
Ms. Tan found such a heady blend of melodrama and psychodrama in her novel’s many mother-daughter conflicts that her “Joy Luck Club,” with all its tearful showdowns and gratifying symmetries, had a stereotypically feminine outlook. But now, handsomely brought to the screen with a cast of dozens of actresses and no men of any consequence, “The Joy Luck Club” is anything but a traditional women’s picture.
As directed simply and forcefully by Wayne Wang, with a screenplay skillfully written by Ms. Tan and Ronald Bass, “The Joy Luck Club” is both sweeping and intimate, a lovely evocation of changing cultures and enduring family ties. Admirers of the best-selling novel will be delighted by the graceful way it has been transferred to the screen. Those unfamiliar with the book will simply appreciate a stirring, many-sided fable, one that is exceptionally well told.
Feeling streamlined despite its more-than-two-hour running time, Mr. Wang’s film glides through the essentials of Ms. Tan’s novel while solving difficult narrative problems with deceptive ease. On film, the story’s point of view makes sudden, acrobatic shifts from one character to another, in a manner that artfully underscores the story’s many parallels. Since Mr. Wang must span three generations, describing the early life of each Joy Luck mah-jongg player and sometimes even creating links between her mother and her daughter, the agility with which he weaves together these elements is at times quite amazing. Buried beneath the particulars of each reminiscence, there is the quiet certainty that the film’s characters are, in some fundamental way, the same.
If this idea produces a certain patness by the time “The Joy Luck Club” is over, it also helps to impose order on an otherwise sprawling narrative. And some of the film’s segments are so beautifully realized that their predictable aspects never detract from their emotional power.
Despite its huge cast, the film is virtually stolen by Tsai Chin as the sly, acerbic Auntie Lindo and Tamlyn Tomita as her beautiful, headstrong daughter, Waverly, whose stories intersect in a particularly adroit way. Auntie Lindo, the unofficial leader of the Joy Luck Club by sheer force of her personality, is presented as a 15-year-old girl (Irene Ng) whose marriage is arranged by a matchmaker because her mother cannot afford to support her. When the marriage proves disastrous, Lindo schemes her way out of it in a fashion that reveals much about the tough, calculating woman she will grow up to be.
Lindo is later seen in America, hovering over little Waverly (Vu Mai) in what is surely an overreaction to her own childhood abandonment. Yet Waverly grows up to be just as cunning and rebellious as Lindo was, and their story reaches a breaking point as Waverly prepares to marry a man of whom her mother disapproves. In a tearful yet remarkably soap-free confrontation, which Mr. Wang stages in a beauty parlor, this mother and daughter voice the timeless sentiments on which “The Joy Luck Club” turns: “You don’t know the power you have over me!” and “Nothing I can do can ever, ever please you!” This film’s emotional impact will be felt by anyone who has ever experienced such feelings over a parent or a child.
It would be easy for Mr. Wang to lose the men in the audience at such moments, particularly because the film’s husbands and boyfriends are all such cads or fools, and because its daughters barely seem to have fathers at all. But “The Joy Luck Club” creates such a powerful sense of its older women’s suffering, and presents such brutalizing events in several of their lives, that its impact achieves a welcome degree of universality. These are sad, gripping stories, eloquently told, and only occasionally are they softened by greeting-card saccharinity. Only late in the film, when some of the weaker anecdotes surface and when the structure of these tales becomes too familiar, does “The Joy Luck Club” lose steam.
The four mah-jongg players, looking surprisingly modern and Americanized on screen, are ably played by Ms. Chin, Lisa Lu, Kieu Chinh and France Nuyen, the latter a beautiful and familiar face long absent from stage and screen. (“The World of Suzie Wong,” in which Ms. Nuyen once starred, is fleetingly criticized as the sort of mock-Asian entertainment that “The Joy Luck Club” very clearly is not. Mr. Wang has assembled an enormous and terrifically effective group of Asian-American actors for his cast.)
Among the younger players, Ming-Na Wen has the pivotal role of June, who is off to find her long-lost siblings and whose going-away party becomes the pretext for bringing all these characters together. June is still mourning the recent death of her mother, which makes it odd that the party is so lavish and jolly that it includes barely a trace of grief. But then “The Joy Luck Club,” for all the harshness of the events it describes, has more than a little of Hollywood at its heart. And Hollywood has been unusually well served by this richly sentimental tale.
This film is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian).
It has sexual situations and implied violence. The Joy Luck Club Directed by Wayne Wang; written by Amy Tan and Ronald Bass, based on the novel by Ms. Tan; director of photography, Amir Mokri; edited by Maysie Hoy; music by Rachel Portman; production designer, Donald Graham Burt; produced by Mr. Wang, Ms. Tan, Mr. Bass and Patrick Markey; released by Hollywood Pictures. Running time: 135 minutes. This film is rated R. Suyuan . . . Kieu Chinh Lindo . . . Tsai Chin Ying Ying . . . France Nuyen An Mei . . . Lisa Lu June . . . Ming-Na Wen Waverly . . . Tamlyn Tomita Lena . . . Lauren Tom Rose . . . Rosalind Chao
The Joy Luck Club
The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan is a novel that’s talk about the story fo four women has universal relevance. This novel is divided into four sections of four stories each, about four mothers and four daughters, carries symbloic weight. ” The Joy Luck Club” flashes between the live of four Chinese-American women during their lives in pre-revolutionary China ad present day San Francisco, which is place where each finds herself confronted, at times, by difficulties with her daughter. At the center of it all is daughter June, also name as Ming-Na Wen. Her mother Suyuan is recently deceased and, as a gift is her memory, Suyuan’s three closest friends arrange to send June back to China to meet her tow half-sisters. This have give the flashback to the harsh days Suyuan and the three surviving friends endured separately in China.The similiar satituation have happens to me when I went back to China for the first time of my Life. I live in the United States for many years, so I had more American thoughts than Chinese thoughts. When I first got there I said to myself “This is place where I born and the place wh
The reason why was just because the only time she exerted it was to do a bad thing in her eyes, which was killing her unborn first son. She was married to a bad man who left her ater a short time to follow other women. She was very pretty when she was a young girl. Ying-Ying was not expected to have her own will and makie her own way through life. Clair was being responsibility for her own fate, and not to rely on someone else, and not to live in the shadow of anybody. They only tried to be good to each other. Clair have left her first husband’sand return home. Clair family, they never had real communication . here my mom and my dad had half of their life. So this ended up that bother her husband and daughter did not know about her first marriage. “Lindo who’s also know as Tsai Chin, was sold into marriage at the age of 15 and relied on her own wit to escape to America. she have abandoned herself to whatever life offered her. guess what! The result of this was a disaster.
Essays
The Joy Luck Club: Movie versus Book
In the novel, The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan, it tells of four Chinese women drawn together in San Francisco to play mah jong, and tell stories of the past. These four women and their families all lived in Chinatown and belong to the First Chinese Baptist Church. They were not necessarily religious, but found They could improve their home China. This is how the woo’s, the Hsu’s, the Jong’s and the St Clair’s met in 1949.
The first member of the Joy Luck Club to die was Suyuan Woo. Her daughter, Jing-mei “June” Woo, is asked to sit in and take her mother’s place at playing mah jong. Memories of the past are shared by the three women left, An-mei Hsu, Lindo Jong and Ying-ying St Clair. June Woo learns of the real secret her mother carried to her grave from her mother’s friends. The twin baby girls, her half sisters, Suyuan pushed in a Wheelbarrow as she escaped from the Japanese. Due to sickness, Suyuan can no longer carry her babies, and is forced to leave them on the side of the road. She lives her whole life not knowing if they are alive or dead.
In the book, the Woo’s left for America to build a better life for themselves. Suyuan Woo wanted to have a daughter like herself, and no one would look down on her. It was important that she speak perfect English and hopefully not share in the same tragedies and sorrows she had known.
The movie brought this concept out very vividly. You were able to imagine the time and place and the emotions of the characters. Their anger in the early years, how women and children were treated as possessions. The book spoke of Rose Hsu Jordan, daughter of An-mei Hsu, who had seven brothers and sisters. A very tragic time in her life when her brother Bing drowns at age 1 while she was in charge of watching him. The movie does not touch upon this tragic event and brings out the rich family Rose marries into, and the instant rejection from her boyfriends mother. Rose unhappiness in her marriage with Tod, is similar to the unhappiness her mother had throughout her life.
Lindo Jong was a special character in the book , referring to promises she made to her mother as a young girl, and keeping them throughout her life. She was actually abandoned by her family and Lindo was sent to live with her future husband’s family. She never complained because she would never dishonor her mother.
The movie did an excellent job of showing us the culture during that time in China and how the matchmaker arranged the marriages at an early age. She is a very smart girl and figures out how she could get out of this marriage and still keep her promise to her mother. She puts the blame on the matchmaker and is released from the marriage. When speaking of strong characters in the book, one would have to include Waverly Jong, daughter of Lindo Jong. She was a bright child who became a famous chess player, which made her mother very proud.
The movie brought out her unhappiness in her life and the unhappy relationship with her mother. The two shared similar fcars even though they lived in different countries and different times. Ying-ying St Clair, according to the book, was married at an early age and referred to her husband as a “bad” man. In fact she tried so hard to forget him she forgets his name. She tells of taking her baby before it was born because of the hate she has for her husband.
The movie tells the story a little different in reference to her baby. After her husband comes home with his mistress and causes her shame, she drowns her tiny infant while bathing him. A tragic and emotional part in the movie.
Lena St Clair, daughter of Lindo St Clair, may not have had such a tragic relationship with her husband as did her mother; but she was unable to find happiness in her marriage. The book and movie were similar in showing us the relationship she had with Harold. They were business partners also, but he made more money than she. They shared everything right down the middle and kept a running journal. They also decided not to have children which goes along with their relationship.
In the final conclusion, the twin baby girls did live and reunited with their half sister, June Woo, in China. This story actually includes three generations of mothers and daughters sharing same or similar tragedies and unhappiness. Mothers protecting their children, wanting their daughters to know their worth. The influence of mothers on their daughters every day life, showing respect was very important. The cultural rules these women were raised with for so many years in China had a life time effect on their lives. They wanted things different for their daughters in America, but they still compared life as it should be in China. I was touched by the strength and courage these women had whether they lived in China or America.
