Better Luck Tomorrow

Better Luck Tomorrow is a film directed by Justin Lin in 2002. A boy named Ben is an overachiever but is part of a group of other boys who get into mischief. Ben is the stereotypical "model minority" Asian American — an intelligent, hard-working high school freshman, confident that he will get into an Ivy League college. Daric is the savvy senior valedictorian who gets Ben and his friends Virgil and Han to start selling cheat sheets. This "business" spirals into scams at stores, stealing a new shipment of computers from the school, and eventually into selling drugs. Between working at a fast-food restaurant and volunteering at the local hospital, Ben discovers that kids who are smart enough can get away with anything. Throughout the film, their lives consist of a mix of drugs, sex, violence, and Academic Decathlon tournaments. Ben and his suburban gang challenge the stereotypes of youth, Asian Americans, and suburban life. 

Ben falls for this girl named Stephanie in his class, and he wants to win her over but she is dating this jerk named Steve whom could care less about her. Even though Ben excels over everything else, the film makes it seem like Ben has never been in a true relationship before. For half of the film, Ben is in fact a virgin. When he loses his virginity to a prostitute, he becomes more confident in himself because he finally did it and he enjoyed it. Stephanie and Ben are good friends but he never takes advantage of her and he respects that she has a boyfriend even though he knows Steve is no good for her. Ben even accepts Steve’s request to bring Stephanie to the formal. Ben ends up getting into trouble the more he hangs out with his group. At the end of the film they end up murdering Steve and burying him in the backyard. He never tells Stephanie what happens and she seemed to care less that Steve has not returned her calls, so at the end of the film she drives away with Ben not knowing where Steve is. She seems more content with Ben. 

According to director Lin, ”The theme of Better Luck Tomorrow is identity. You have to develop your identity, whatever you're trying to grow into. If you adopt an identity and don't have the patience to grow into it, the identity can overtake you.” I watched this film twice because I was really impressed and loved it so much. The story was different than anything else I’ve seen especially amongst the Asian culture. Yes there were some stereotypes in the film of Ben being an overachiever and being really smart, but there were other aspects of the film that were more important. The fact that this group seemed to be like the “asian mafia” surprised me. I hated Steve’s character and I didn’t think they would do anything about it but they did and I loved that choice from the director and writers to kill off that character.