Movie Review: ‘Boogie’

Review by James Lindorf

Eddie Huang may be best known for writing the memoir that inspired the hit show “Fresh off the Boat,” which ran for six seasons on ABC. Eddie is looking to change that narrative by writing and directing his first feature-length movie. “Boogie” continues Eddie’s focus on what it is like for a Chinese kid growing up in America and will be available through VOD and in theaters starting March 5th.

Alfred “Boogie” Chin (Taylor Takahashi) is a high school basketball phenom living in Queens, N.Y., with his overbearing mother and recently paroled father. Boogie dreams of making it into the NBA but is having a hard time getting top 10 programs to commit to him. To earn more attention, Boogie transfers to a school that only won three games last year. While it may not give him a chance to win a lot, it will allow him to take on Monk (Bashar “Pop Smoke” Jackson), the number 1 ranked player in the city. Pressure mounts as Boogie must find a way to navigate a new school, new girlfriend, on-court rivals, and the burden of expectation. Life is hard enough when you are doing it for yourself, but when you have the weight of your community and 5,000 years of culture on your back, it can be suffocating.

Boogie loves being an “ABC,” American-born Chinese. He is proud of his culture and wants to show the world he can be more than the “model immigrant.” However, he is a kid, and as such, he also wants to do things his way and for his reasons without worrying about letting everyone down. That duality is what makes Boogie such a good character. If you can get past his bravado and brash entitled attitude, you will be moved by his story. The audience is a lot like Boogie’s love interest Eleanor (Taylour Paige). She initially has zero interest in Boogie’s game on the court or his romantic game, but eventually, she comes around. The pair has good chemistry, but their relationship feels rushed and not in Huang’s wheelhouse as a writer. He does excel at humor and explaining the difficulty of growing up as a minority where you are underrepresented, disrespected, and treated as a monolith.

Like Huang, this is Takahashi’s first movie, and it shows at times. His acting is a lot like his basketball game, good but not great. To be fair, Taylor could be great at basketball, but the combination of Huang and cinematographer Brett Jutkiewicz is not a team that is capable of shooting the sport in an exciting way. With the showdown between Boogie and Monk looming large over the film’s climax, it is a letdown that it doesn’t live up to the rest of the movie. As an actor, Takahashi is best in the high-energy moments, with his performance faltering just a bit during some of the quiet moments. Part of it is the delivery, and the other part is the dialogue which feels forced at times to sound youthful or cool.

“Boogie” isn’t perfect; it shows the inexperience of its creator and its star at times, but it is still in the 90th+ percentile of debut films. A tweak here and there, like a second unit cinematographer for the action and handing the script off for a little polish, and it would have been nearly perfect. As it stands, Boogie is solid 4 out of 5 for its moving story and powerful message.

Rating: R (Language Throughout|Some Drug Use|Sexual References)
Genre: Drama
Original Language: English
Director: Eddie Huang
Producer: Josh Bratman, Josh McLaughlin, Michael Tadross
Writer: Eddie Huang
Release Date (Theaters): March 5th, 2021 Limited
Runtime: 1h 29m
Production Co: Immersive Pictures, Wink Productions