Audience Member
After seven years of research to understand the mystery of white male attraction to Asian women, Debbie Lum decides to focus on the one story of Steven, a late-middle aged, white toll taker in the Bay Area, who is seeking a mate in Sandy, a young woman from a village in China. Their story--from internet contact to married life in California--has a wonderful if bumpy arc, and to her apparent chagrin, Debbie's voice acknowledges in the end that the couple is still thriving after four years.
By its close, the movie is as much about their unusual partnership as it is Debbie's realization that she has crossed the documentarian's boundary of objectivity by giving advice to Sandy while judging her for being a "gold digger" and judging Steven for, well, being Steven--a man of modest means who is seeking "love" over a very long distance. Of course, no documentary film is "objective" anymore than a news magazine is, and one could certainly argue that a personal interpretation may offer more insight and understanding than "just the facts." But the film is subjective in the wrong way: it condescends to Steven, making him exemplar of the social phenomenon that Debbie's project first endeavored to understand.
Had the film tackled the messy truth unearthed by seven years of talking to men afflicted with Asian fever, it might not have been so easy to shape into an engaging narrative, but it may have been more revealing of the mysterious reasons people find others attractive and why some (many?) of those infatuations evolve into lasting, deep connections. I'm convinced that something more than sexual colonization or the desire for a submissive spouse--perhaps evolutionary forces--is at play here, and while the fetishizing and objectifying of her into a lowly expectation of good sex is unfair, even dehumanizing, this describes only the tabloid fringe of the phenomenon. Lum herself is married to a Caucasian man, and yet this fact is given barely a five second nod in the film, after which the husband utters one comment off camera but never speaks to the reasons for his choice of Debbie as a mate.
Nevertheless, it's a well told story, with the added attraction of describing some of the challenges and pitfalls of shaping research into a non-fiction story. In the end, people respond to story, though it may not deliver the whole complex truth.
Rated 2.5/5 Stars •
Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars
01/19/23
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Audience Member
At first it all seemed ridiculous but by the end of the whole movie I actually felt quite complicated.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
02/20/23
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gareth d
An interesting documentary, which I somehow expected to be rather creepy, seedy and tepid. But it's really rather engaging, and in the end you get drawn into the relationship and start rooting for the couple.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
03/31/23
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Audience Member
This was the most disturbing and creepy documentary I've ever watched. The main reason for wanting to marry his "ideal mate" was because she looked really Chinese?
Rated 1.5/5 Stars •
Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars
01/24/23
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Audience Member
I watching Seeking Asian Female and the first thing that struck me was the biased attitude and instrusiveness of the documentarian, Debbie Lum. It seems to me not only slightly apparent but blantantly obvious that Sandy was herself a "selfish pig" intent on one thing and one thing only; her objective to find and older American male and use him for her purposes of moving to the United States where she would have much opportunity. Sandy her transparency, did what "she had to do" to get what she wanted even if it meant marrying and having sex with an lonely older not-so-well-off sloppy pudgy American man. If because of her single-minded goal of residing in American, she found herself "in love" with the slob, that was his luck.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
01/31/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Very sweet, likeable subjects and a fascinating story
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
01/16/23
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