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Mah Jong Orphan
 

 
Length: 45 min
Released: 1996
Ages: High School
College
Adult
 
Buy DVD:
$195.00  
 
Buy Online Streaming
 
 
Reminiscent of Amy Tan's Joy Luck Club, this real life film focuses on the widening chasm between a Chinese mother, Suzan, a first generation immigrant, and her daughter Lilly, eager to assimilate. The mother and her friends are all avid mah jong players, which serves to connect them to their old country. Lilly, like most children of immigrants, wants to fit in with her Caucasian friends and rejects her mother's values. Their conflicts are both generational and cultural.

In this fresh and spontaneous film, the audience has the rare privilege of simultaneously sharing in the women's poignant and sometimes humorous discoveries about themselves and each other. Suzan talks of her disappointment at Lilly's choice of a non-Chinese husband. Lilly, to her own surprise discovers a deep need to pass on her cultural heritage to her son. Having a grandchild heals the rift between the generations.

The universality of the issues and the difficulties seen in this mother/daughter relationship transcend any particular race, culture or class and strike a collective nod of recognition among us all.
 
 
"Irresistibly charming..." - St. John's Women's Film Festival, 1994
"This fine and insightful documen- tary reveals a great deal about the immigrant experience..." - The Globe and Mail
"This film is fun, not a dirge on conflicting values." - Canadian Forum
"This intensely personal story of Lilly Chow, who marches to a different drummer, is an absolute delight. A fresh documentary with universal appeal." Booklist, Editor's Choice
 
 
Bronze Apple, National Educational Film & Video Festival, 1995
National Women's Studies Association, 1996

 
 
 
• Immigration
 
• Multicultural
 
• Women's Studies
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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