This is an adequate movie. It preaches too much. The characters are too predictable.
The subject could have been handled in a vastly more interesting fashion. Becoming an American is something every ethnic group has come to deal with, and with each, the process eventually becomes the same: one has to abandon one's ethnic tribal loyalties, and adopt loyalty to the new tribe, the tribe of America.
It's okay to keep eating food made using grandma's recipes (and share that food with the rest of us--we might like it very much), and maybe teaching the grandkids stuff about the old life, but belonging first to the tribe of America must be be placed above all old ties. There are many ways to God, but any God who devalues good people outside of the old tribe probably won't work so well in America.
The ending of this movie ventured into the maudlin...why must movies overdo these things?
The subject could have been handled in a vastly more interesting fashion. Becoming an American is something every ethnic group has come to deal with, and with each, the process eventually becomes the same: one has to abandon one's ethnic tribal loyalties, and adopt loyalty to the new tribe, the tribe of America.
It's okay to keep eating food made using grandma's recipes (and share that food with the rest of us--we might like it very much), and maybe teaching the grandkids stuff about the old life, but belonging first to the tribe of America must be be placed above all old ties. There are many ways to God, but any God who devalues good people outside of the old tribe probably won't work so well in America.
The ending of this movie ventured into the maudlin...why must movies overdo these things?