Shortcomings

“Shortcomings doesn’t try to force any answers on us, acknowledging the thorniness of honest, unfiltered conversations.”

Title: Shortcomings (2023)
Director: Randall Park 👨🏻🇺🇸
Writer: Adrian Tomine 👨🏻🇺🇸

Reviewed by Elaine 👩🏻🇺🇸

Technical: 3.5/5

Shortcomings opens with a cheeky wink, showing a rom-com that’s a clear nod to Crazy Rich Asians (2018). Ben Tanaka (Justin H. Min) sits bemused through the rapturous applause from the theater audience. Afterwards in the lobby, another Asian man proclaims, "It's glossy, but it's ours." Ben can't suppress his grimace, clearly anything but convinced. It’s as if Shortcomings asks us, from the get-go: What is the media for Asian Americans? Is there even such a thing?

As much as the overly critical Ben might scoff at such pontification, he himself represents a landmark in Asian American film as a misanthropic protagonist. Weary from Ben’s negative energy, his girlfriend Miko Hayashi (Ally Maki) takes an internship in New York City, initiating a break in their relationship and setting him adrift. As he continues his dead-end job as a theater manager in the Bay Area, he brunches with his best (and probably only) friend Alice Kim (Sherry Cola) and explores other relationships. It’s all rather … ordinary. And somehow, because of that, it feels revolutionary.

Adapted from Adrian Tomine’s 2007 graphic novel, Shortcomings shines when it sticks to the source material, with its comfortable banter and acerbic wit. Tomine’s characters are genuine in their hypocrisy, consistent in their inconsistency. Ben derides the race politics of his girlfriend when she accuses him of having a specific type. (Blonde, white women.) However, he then denigrates a couple consisting of a white man and an Asian woman, calling the man a “Rice King.” Tomine doesn’t try to force any answers on us, thereby acknowledging the complexity of their relationships and the thorniness of honest, unfiltered conversations.

On the other hand, as Randall Park’s directorial debut, the film falters when he shows his hand too much. He’s eager to show us how serious Ben is as a filmmaker by leaving around Criterion Collection DVDs of Tampopo (1985) and Frances Ha (2012), or by having Ben flip through a book of storyboards from Parasite (2020). The heavy-handedness isn’t just in the visuals; Park oversimplifies the wonderful ambiguity that made Tomine’s work so ahead of its time. In a notable example, the original open-ended and contemplative ending gets turned into a send-off with a rosy voice-over.

Furthermore, Shortcomings might not have the gloss of its opening Crazy Rich Asians facsimile, but the vibrant palette felt more appropriate for an indie rom-com than the meandering, painful slice-of-life it is. Perhaps that’s coming from someone more familiar with the black-and-white panels of the original medium, but its tonal discrepancies were similarly echoed in meta moments that distract the audience. In one scene, Gene (Jacob Batalon) announces that the recent Spider-Man movies are his favorite, alluding to the actor’s role as Ned Leeds in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Other punchlines recall a jokey comedy, at odds with the vulnerability that’s otherwise on display here.

Gender: 3.75/5
Does it pass the Bechdel Test? NOPE

Although the title card of Shortcomings features Ben, Alice, and Miko, the film takes place entirely from Ben’s point of view. It doesn’t even give Miko enough screen-time to qualify her as a side character, and we certainly don’t see enough to forgive her character inconsistencies. Even though one of her main arguments with Ben is about how he’s attracted to white women, she doesn’t seem to take issue with her own relationship with a white man at the end of the movie. In fact, Miko and her actions exist to justify Ben’s, as if her cheating renders his infidelity acceptable. Even worse is the fact that her new boyfriend collects Asian artifacts, or that he ludicrously takes up a defensive karate-like posture against Ben. Rather than growing as Alice does, or taking a small step forward like Ben, Miko doesn’t have any depth other than to be an antagonistic catalyst for Ben.

Alice at least plays a larger role, exulting in her own messy glory as she deals with her issues. She completes a separate arc within the story, and she’s given the same emotional leeway that Ben is. When Ben tells her that she’s a “very unreliable moral compass,” she quickly rebuts, “I don’t remember signing up for that.”

Shortcomings attempts to give nuance to its women rather than simply delegating them to a call sheet of Ben’s relationship failures. Ben, of course, is often unable to see the women beyond his own desires, but the ending montage at least gives us time with each of them, showing their futures and fleshing them out as individuals with ambitions and dreams.

Race: 5/5

Since Crazy Rich Asians, Asian Americans have seen themselves represented on the screen through titles like The Farewell (2019), Everything, Everywhere, All at Once (2022), and this summer’s Past Lives (2023) and Joy Ride (2023). But it’s still rare to see something like Shortcomings with an Asian American protagonist who’s this judgmental, snobby, and thoroughly unlikeable—and I mean that in the best way. Ben doesn’t grapple with diasporic angst, yet his pushback against his cultural place in society is still very much a struggle for identity. Miko makes a valid point at the beginning of the movie when saying, “As a community we’ve waited a long time to see ourselves reflected.” But Ben reflects an Asian who’s a far cry from the dazzling ideal that Michelle Yeoh creates whenever she graces the screen. It’s empowering in a different way.

Although Tomine’s Shortcomings came out in 2007, when first approached by studio executives, the author quickly found himself disillusioned by requests to “rewrite the script so that it would be castable.” It was around that time that Park first connected to the graphic novel, during a period of his life when he wasn’t able to find many roles as a Korean American man. Fast forward to the present, with Park no longer the right age to play the protagonist, but very much interested in preserving everything that made Shortcomings so singular, including its adherence to an authentic cast.

Perhaps it’s this adherence that led to the decision to keep Ben’s character Japanese American, despite being played by Korean American Min. Similarly, Alice is a Korean American character played by Cola, who’s Chinese American (although for the film, it’s explained that she has mixed Korean and Chinese heritage). It’s laudable for the film to want to keep Ben Japanese American, especially when Tomine considers Shortcomings to be ”the most personal thing he’s ever done,” but I was brought out of the movie when Ben gave a seemingly self-referential line about how most people mistake him for Korean. It also lessens the impact of scenes such as when Ben admits to not speaking any Japanese. Still, these are minor grumbles in a film that strives to represent its East Asian American characters honestly.

Bonus for LGBTQ: +0.75

Alice is a proud lesbian, played by Cola who’s bisexual. Alice has more success in dating than Ben. Furthermore, while she starts the film as a serial dater, she also falls into a happy, committed relationship. I do wish the movie didn’t feel the need to reduce her love life by implying that monogamy is the best possible future for her. But I think that’s more a problem of the movie trying to give everyone a neat ending.

Shortcomings doesn’t necessarily get full points though, given its derogatory treatment of a bisexual character named Sasha (Debby Ryan). She’s consistently referred to as a “fence-sitter,” even by the progressive Alice. When Sasha breaks up with Ben, he assumes she’s going “back on the other side of the fence.” This may be intentional in the portraits of Alice and Ben as flawed, and even prejudiced people, but it isn’t entirely clear. But at least the film’s end shows Sasha in a happy relationship with another woman, emphasizing that Ben’s or Alice’s judgment has no bearing on whoever she decides to date.

Mediaversity Grade: B+ 4.33/5

There’s something potentially revelatory in the workings of Shortcomings, with its talented cast and Tomine’s realism. But even if it doesn’t quite hit the mark, it still takes a worthwhile step forward for Asian American representation. Just don’t tell that to Ben—he would hate being a part of the discourse.

Like Shortcomings? Try these other titles starring Justin H. Min or Sherry Cola.

Grade: BLiAugust 7, 2023Great for: Race, Great for: LGBTQ