A Movie That Understands the 2000s-Internet Generation
The first film I watched through my fingers this year was not Longlegs or The Watchers—or anything close to a horror movie. It was Dìdi (弟弟), a coming-of-age indie I caught in January at the Sundance Film Festival, about a 13-year-old Taiwanese American boy doing 13-year-old-boy things. Much of Dìdi, which will be released in theaters nationwide this week, is tender and wonderfully charming. Because it’s set in 2008, it also re-creates the nascent days of social media in uncannily accurate detail. Seeing the film’s protagonist, Chris (played by Izaac Wang), log in to AOL Instant Messenger spiked my blood pressure. Watching him open a chat window to talk to his crush—only to backspace and rewrite his opening salvo to her over and over—made me cringe in worry for his well-being and, yes, cover my face with my hands.
Maybe that sounds extreme, but anyone who grew up during the peak years of AIM, Myspace, and Facebook probably remembers the visceral terror of making decisions about your every keystroke online. Building profile pages, choosing your Top 8 friends, curating the right collection of favorite films and bands so you’d seem cool—this was stomach-churning stuff for a teenager. I remember the first time I tried to flirt on AIM; I signed out in a panic.
