“Crazy Rich Asians” screenwriter Adele Lim swings for the fences with her directorial debut, “Joy Ride,” and knocks it out of the park with this rowdy, raucous comedy about a search for identity and finding yourself in friendship. Hilariously daring, deeply moving, and stereotype-busting in equal measure, “Joy Ride” is also the raunchiest movie to most likely to make you shed a tear.
Broadway and “Emily in Paris” superstar Ashley Park plays Audrey, who was adopted from China as a baby by white American parents (Annie Mumolo and David Denham). She and her bestie Lolo (Sherry Cola) have been fast friends since the day her parents sought out the only Asian family on the playground, and the odd couple have been a fiercely loyal pair ever since: Audrey the uptight, high-achieving lawyer, Lolo the loutish layabout artist committed to her “body positive” mission statement.
The duo head to China for Audrey’s business trip, where she hopes to lock down an important business deal and make partner. Lolo’s along for the ride as her Chinese translator, but with Lolo around, anything can happen, including her BTS-obsessed cousin Deadeye (Sabrina Wu) tagging along for the ride. They’re also planning to meet up with Audrey’s college friend Kat (Stephanie Hsu), now a massive Chinese movie and TV star. What could go wrong?
In the outrageously heightened world of “Joy Ride”— everything. The girls end up on a harrowing journey into rural China to find Audrey’s birth mother, tangling with a drug smuggler (Meredith Hagner), romping with a men’s basketball team, and posing as a K-pop group along the way (which results in an international scandal). The situations in “Joy Ride” are so ridiculous that one must abandon any notions of real-world rationale in order to simply ride along with the movie's funny and twisted internal logic.
It’s remarkable what Lim, and her co-writers Cherry Chevapravatdumrong and Teresa Hsiao, manage to achieve in just 95 minutes, and how they’re able to intermingle both the poignant and the prurient, thanks to their cast, who is up for anything and everything. Hsu, recently Oscar-nominated for her role in “Everything Everywhere All At Once” demonstrates her gift for physical comedy, as well as her willingness to embrace every silly shenanigan Lim tosses in the direction of Kat, a woman desperately trying to maintain her prim celebrity image in spite of the chaos and temptation swirling around her.
In “Joy Ride,” Lim explores transnational adoptee identity and the Asian-American experience with specificity and humor, but she also doggedly chips away at insidious Asian and Asian-American stereotypes through bawdy body humor, throwing her heroines into transgressive situations in which they must adapt. Drug mule needs to hide the stash? No problem. Stuck in a hotel with a team of hot athletes for a night? Everyone’s getting theirs, in their own way. This is a foursome of distinct women with their own desires, issues and autonomy, as well as their own sexual agency and appetites. Nothing is taboo or off-limits in “Joy Ride,” and the quartet of actors take to these liberated roles with an energetic gusto.
Park and Hsu clearly shine on screen, but Cola and Wu hold their own, and add a unique tone that’s necessary for this group's multi-faceted dynamic. Wu brings a charming blend of puppyish energy and alien androgyny to the ever-surprising Deadeye, while Cola’s laidback, take-no-prisoners attitude proves to be the appropriate foil for the perfectionist Audrey.
On this wild ride, somehow Audrey manages to find what she’s been looking for—herself. And she finds it, not only in Asia, but in the person who has seen her for who she is all along: her best friend. It’s a truly touching message after this incredibly funny, and yes, shocking, journey. It would be a pleasure to watch these four get into another misadventure anytime.
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‘JOY RIDE’
Running time: 1 hour 35 minutes
3 stars out of 4
Rated R for strong and crude sexual content, language throughout, drug content and brief graphic nudity.
Where to watch: In theaters Friday, July 7
