Written and Directed by Kogonada
Starring Colin Farrell, Jodie Turner-Smith, Justin H. Min, Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja
Rated PG
Runtime: 1 hour, 36 minutes
In theaters and on Showtime March 4

by Ryan Silberstein, Managing Editor, Red Herring

After Yang tells the story of a family of four. A father, a mother, a daughter, and their robot, Yang. Like all families, they have good days and bad days. The parents, Jake and Kyra (Farrell and Turner-Smith), have strife that hides under the surface of conversations. They love each other and their adopted daughter Mika (Tjandrawidjaja). They love their robot, Yang (Min). In the future of the film, robots are purchased for a variety of different reasons like companionship and language learning, as well as the reason Yang was brought into this household: as a cultural sibling for a girl adopted by a family that does not share her ethnicity or the culture she was born into. Yang–bought by the family used, err, certified pre-owned–fills the role of babysitter and cultural guide for Mika and her family. Within him, there is a seemingly inexhaustible encyclopedia of information about Chinese culture. As a companion and babysitter for the young girl, he takes some pressure off of her parents. Then, one day, he breaks. 

Kogonada takes this premise and uses it to explore our relationship with objects, family members, and culture. Technology has long promised to bring our objects to life, and I work with several people who are constantly excited about adding things to their home that belong to the Internet of Things (IoT). They want to be able to see what’s in their fridge from their phone, or turn on a fireplace without getting up from the couch. It never sounds like something I want to add to my life, except when I wake up in the middle of the night and remember I forgot to set the dishwasher to run, but I know if I get up, I won’t get back to sleep without giving my cat a midnight snack. 

But would living in the same digital network as my stuff change my relationship to it? Because my home’s bathroom does not have an exhaust fan or a window with a screen in it (they’re on the renovation list!), we keep a small dehumidifier in there. Mostly, it  helps dry out the room and used towels after showers. About a year ago, the one we had stopped working. I unceremoniously threw it in the trash. I got a new one for about $20, plugged it in, and realized that because we had lost power, the outlet needed to be reset. I pushed the little button, and the new dehumidifier sprung to life. I immediately felt guilty. Not for the $20, I had needlessly spent. There was a bit about consumerist waste and carbon footprints, but really I felt guilt about our old dehumidifier. My mind pictured him on top of a trash heap, blinded by the sun, poured on by the rain, feeling useless and alone. Silly, right? A dehumidifier has no feelings! Blame The Brave Little Toaster. 

At least my dehumidifier doesn’t project feelings. Seeing Jake trying to save Yang–ostensibly on behalf of his daughter’s attachment, but really his own–was deeply resonating. Walking the line between humorous Planes, Trains, and Automobiles-like customer service obstacles about warranties and proprietary connection ports and real grief, Kogonada captures the absurdity that capitalist society presents at our most emotionally vulnerable. Sign here for liability for charges insurance doesn’t cover. Here’s the price list for flowers for a funeral. Now, how much is your love worth? In U.S. dollars, please. 

Kogonada also uses After Yang to explore what happens to our digital footprint when we die. Jake is able to access Yang’s memories, and scientists are fascinated by what technosapiens, as these artificial persons are called, consider to be worth saving. Jake flicks through them, recorded through Yang’s eyes, like he is scrolling through someone else’s Instagram feed. Some algorithm has decided what was important to Yang, and now Jake is there to snoop on it. Are these the things Yang would want him to see? Or would he be embarrassed? Is this an invasion of privacy?

The cultural aspect of Yang’s presence in this household is fascinating. He is no more a Chinese man than Jake or Kyra, but he presents as one and can literally bore you to death with facts about tea. But he doesn’t understand the feeling of tea. He knows the cultural rituals of preparing it, but the tea holds no meaning for him, really. A limitation of his programming. Yet, Kogonada suggests that Mika is comforted by someone who looks like Yang and can speak using Chinese cultural touchstones. What is language or culture if not programming instilled in us by our parents. Kogonada makes the right choice by raising these questions, and doing so in a relatively gentle film allows us to engage with them without feeling judged by the thoughts within us. I didn’t know this was a PG family drama when I hit play, and part of my mind kept expecting After Yang to take a dark, Ex Machina like turn. While there are signs of greater societal danger planted throughout–especially around surveillance and right to repair–Kogonada stays on the family’s level the entire time. 

Colin Farrell’s performance as an often exasperated father is absolutely delightful, and After Yang rests on his perspective, his relationships to the rest of the family creating the film’s connective tissue. Farrell is one of those actors who never seemed to quite get the career he deserved. After breaking out in Minority Report, he bounced around for a bit, never becoming the leading man he maybe could have, and despite working with auteurs like Terrence Malick, and Michael Mann, he always seemed more comfortable in smaller projects. Regardless, he’s consistently great, and only rarely flirts with franchise projects. Over the last 20 years, he’s put together a great body of work, even with some truly bad films mixed in there (Winter’s Tale is still baffling). 

The way Kogonada takes us through After Yang is consistently compelling; he folds familiar emotions and experiences into a novel setting. There’s a melancholy throughout that echoes the early parts of A.I. told from the parents’ perspective. I’ll be thinking about this for quite a while, and I already look forward to revisiting it and finding new angles to unpack and explore within this handcrafted science fiction tale.