21 And Over - 21玩過界 - 21成人鳥

21 and Over (21玩過界/21成人鳥) is an 2013 film. The movie stars Justin Chon, Miles Teller, Skylar Astin, and Sarah Wright. The movie was a box success as it almost tripled the budget cost to make the movie.

Chon plays Jeff Chang, a pre-med student about to turn 21. On the day of his birthday, his best friends from high school show up at his doorsteps to celebrate his 21st birthday. Chang's father is there and scares his friends with his fury presence. The father reminds Chang that he has an important medical school interview the next morning. After the father leaves, Chang's friends convince him to go out for 1 drink. Yeah right, 1 drink. As it goes the night gets crazy, Jeff Chang gets wasted, and the night is a cat and mouse chase of stupid on stupid. As the interview time approaches, will Jeff Chang make it?

Chon is a YouTube celeb, but came to fame as one of the Bella's High School friends in the Twilight movies. But Chon is in his 30s now and he looks it when trying to pull off a 21 year old. But it is show biz and younger humans play teenagers all the time. The movie did play to some of the stereotypes that non-Asians have of Asians. Asians are good at school and go on to be doctors and lawyers. The movie tries to flip that around by showing that Jeff Chang can get crazy and messed up like an non-Asian. Imagine that. It also shows that Asians are not perfect and that the stress of expectations can cause them to crack and break. Which to a lesser extend is also a recent stereotype formed from non-positive incidents.

As a whole, I am not a big fan of Alcoholic binge movies. That's a part of American culture I will never fully embrace. In Europe, Alcohol is part of regular consumption and if you get drunk, its shameful. In American culture, that's expected to happen if you want to have a good time. Unfortunately, it's also a cultural expectation in the CJK countries as well.

I like that the producers took a chance with an Asian lead and tried to flip some stereotypes of Asians. What I would have preferred is that Jeff Chang being Asian wouldn't be a selling point and that he's normal, things like academic stress and career ambiguity are part of college life. They did try to throw that same logic onto Jeff Chang's two best friends from college. Unlike Jeff Chang, it was normal and part of being non-Asian.