Director: Sean Wang

Stars: Izaac Wang, Joan Chen, Shirley Chen, Chang Li Hua, Mahaela Park

Writer-director Sean Wang brings an appealing freshness to the familiar coming-of-age tale. Chris Wang (Wang), nicknamed Didi, is in his final year of middle school in 2008 Freemont California. His dad is mostly away, and his mother Chunsing (Chen) is struggling to juggle raising Didi and his smart big sister Vivien (Chen), due to start college next term, with looking after her eccentric mother-in-law (Chang). Didi’s friends are a diverse bunch with an irreverent take on their various racial differences. Nevertheless, Didi still feels self-conscious, both in his tentative romance with pretty schoolmate Madi (Park) and in his attempts to trade-up in his friendships by befriending a bunch of skateboarders by posing as a short filmmaker. The picture boasts a keen sense of the Facebook/MySpace-period milieu replete with awkward online encounters and apposite needle drops. Wang turns in a winningly naturalistic central performance, although more time with his long-suffering, wistful mum, soulfully played by Joan Chen, would have been welcome.

David Willoughby

Follow David on @DWill_Crackfilm