For the longest time in Lloyd Lee Choi’s Lucky Lu, I waited for two things: when Lu would finally turn lucky, and when New York would reveal its postcard sheen with the Brooklyn Bridge or Central Park. In this bruising immigrant drama, neither arrives.
The film captures two nightmarish days in the life of deliveryman Lu as his wife and daughter travel from China to join him. In that narrow window, he loses the bike that keeps him employed and the rental apartment meant to house his family. The narrative becomes a breathless chase as Lu scrambles to gather money by any means necessary.
It is striking that this story unfolds in New York. Lucky Lu may be the least glamorous NYC-set film in recent memory. Centred on Chinese blue-collar workers, the American Dream is absent from Lu’s journey, and so is luck, which pointedly stays out of reach.
Choi lays bare a world where immigrants will do anything to survive, whether it is begging, stealing or something in between. Yet the film preserves small pockets of decency. The unspoken camaraderie between Lu and his network hints at a stubborn human goodness that refuses to die.
The film hits its emotional stride once Lu’s family arrives. His day out with his perceptive young daughter is its clear highlight. Yaya’s intuitive gaze forces us to wonder how a father processes the possibility of looking like a failure in his child’s eyes. Lucky Lu quietly addresses several questions around fatherhood, family and the fragile support structures within suburban NYC’s Chinese community.
Chang Chen anchors the film with a severely affecting performance. Carabelle Manna Wei, as Yaya, is a revelation whose quiet reactions elevate every scene she is in.
Choi completes this neorealist fable with a tense, evocative score that underlines how some lives remain burdened regardless of the wealth around them. The filmmaker packs enough dramatic possibilities to explore how the definition of a big city might vary for many. As Lucky Lu closes on a very poignant, stoic note, we can only empathize with the millions who move into a richer civilisation, only to enter a vicious circle of struggle. In Lu’s quiet surrender, the film reminds us that survival itself can be an act of defiance. And in that stillness, Lucky Lu delivers its most haunting truth: some dreams are not pursued so much as they are survived.
Rating: ★★★★
Lloyd Lee Choi’s Lucky Lu was screened at the 56th edition of IFFI Goa.
