The Joy Luck Club
My apologies to Amy Tan and her fans, but I have never read one of her books.
Movies are usually ruined by reading the source material and that movie so perfectly crystalized a thought in my mind that I hate to chance destroying it by reading the book, acknowledging full well that it could possibly ENHANCE the experience.
In a nutshell, the story chronicles four mothers and the multi-dimensional relationships with their daughters. By flipping back and forth from the present to the children's experiences and to their mothers' pasts as children and young adults, you see what they cannot see in each other: what happens to us today changes who we are and can potentially affect generations as yet unborn.
Let me simplify it with a favorite holiday story: A couple are preparing a holiday meal for their family. The husband notices that his wife...per usual...slices both ends off the ham before placing it in the pan to bake. Cuious he asks why and she explains "that's how you do it, my mother ALWAYS did it that way."
When his mother-in-law arrives to partake, he asks her the same question: Why? and is met with the same answer..."That's how you do it, my mother ALWAYS did it that way." Finally, he gets an opportunity to ask the matriarch herself: "Nana, why do you have to slice the ends of a ham to bake it?" To which she replies, "Oh, you don't HAVE TO, I just always did it because my oven was too small."
And there you have it. Your family may have habits and traditions based off past inconveinences that are meaningless today. There may not be anyone alive who even remembers how or why they began. I may, from time to time, crack one open and see if I can spot the source.
Movies are usually ruined by reading the source material and that movie so perfectly crystalized a thought in my mind that I hate to chance destroying it by reading the book, acknowledging full well that it could possibly ENHANCE the experience.
In a nutshell, the story chronicles four mothers and the multi-dimensional relationships with their daughters. By flipping back and forth from the present to the children's experiences and to their mothers' pasts as children and young adults, you see what they cannot see in each other: what happens to us today changes who we are and can potentially affect generations as yet unborn.
Let me simplify it with a favorite holiday story: A couple are preparing a holiday meal for their family. The husband notices that his wife...per usual...slices both ends off the ham before placing it in the pan to bake. Cuious he asks why and she explains "that's how you do it, my mother ALWAYS did it that way."
When his mother-in-law arrives to partake, he asks her the same question: Why? and is met with the same answer..."That's how you do it, my mother ALWAYS did it that way." Finally, he gets an opportunity to ask the matriarch herself: "Nana, why do you have to slice the ends of a ham to bake it?" To which she replies, "Oh, you don't HAVE TO, I just always did it because my oven was too small."
And there you have it. Your family may have habits and traditions based off past inconveinences that are meaningless today. There may not be anyone alive who even remembers how or why they began. I may, from time to time, crack one open and see if I can spot the source.
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