Pitch Perfect And Its Far-From-Perfect Portrayal of Asian-American Women
Maybe this wouldn’t have hit quite so hard if the only other Asian female were portrayed as a normal human being. Enter Kimmy Jin (Jinhee Joung), the Korean roommate of protagonist Becca (Anna Kendrick). If the Dragon Lady trope was watered down and embodied in an 18-year old college roommate-from-hell, it would take the form of Kimmy Jin. Though the movie only draws on the “cold and mean” aspects of the Dragon Lady, it draws on it pretty hard. Kimmy spends the majority of her screen time glowering at Becca, spurning any friendly advances she makes, and associating only with her brethren from the Korean Student Association.
Kimmy is initially so unrelentingly cold and silent towards Becca, that Becca even questions her ability to speak English. Hey Becca, here’s a thought: maybe Kimmy hates you because you assume she can’t speak English based on her race. Becca the protagonist also has a strange compulsion to refer to her roommate by her full name. It’s almost as though she’s afraid the viewers will forget Kimmy isn’t white if she just uses her first name. We get it–she’s Korean. You can just call her Kimmy.
Again we get a portrayal of an Asian who remains distant due to her lack of talking, who is not easily understood as a person and ultimately remains somewhat “mysterious.” What we end up walking away with from Pitch Perfect are two poor, highly limiting representations of Asian women in film. Asian women are either quiet to the point of having a speech pathology or, if they can talk, they are still cold and won’t say much to you. Either way, they are shown as being different, with that difference solidly rooted in their race.
Listen, I went to a high school and university that were both 50-75 percent Asian, and having grown up around Asian people for the majority of my life, I’d like to point something out that may not be evident from this movie: Asians are actually normal. They are, believe it or not, capable of speaking over 10 decibels, can be warm and friendly, and often even have friends outside their own race.
Shocking as this may seem, the writers of Pitch Perfect seem to be largely unaware of this. Overall, the movie is fun and lighthearted, but its enjoyability factor was reduced by the constant repetition of tired, racially based jokes.
Lee and Joung both played their parts admirably and drew laughs from the audience when they were on-screen, but it’s unfortunate that talented Asian-American actresses are forced into roles that lack depth and rely heavily on their race to sell jokes. With Asian visibility in the media slowly on the climb, we don’t have to settle for ethnic caricatures anymore. Let’s hope Hollywood realizes this and starts creating characters that aren’t reduced to their skin.
Nisha H. is a recent college graduate from the Bay Area. Having majored in Gender & Women’s Studies and Molecular Biology, she intends to eventually pursue medicine. In the meantime, she enjoys writing feminist and racial analyses of pop culture (see above).
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