The reason I really loved this movie was that I finally got to see Filipino and specifically Filipino-Americans. It’s definitely not an experience you get to see (or ever see) especially in movie format. I felt like I really related to this film in different ways and that was invaluable experience for me and I’m glad I got to watch it and discuss it with other APIA folks.
A returning theme that I noticed in our texts was the relationship between father and son. The relationships are always about approval and the absence of a father (whether physical or emotional). I think the closest in similarity would to the Debut would be Donald Duk. Both Ruben and Donald don’t want to be there respective ethnicities and both have huge miscommunication/misunderstandings with their fathers because of this. But I always think it’s important to note that these misunderstandings are almost always resolved in the end in some way. In the Debut, Ruben’s father gives his approval to Ruben going to art school in the best way that he can. It’s stiff and awkward and almost didn’t seem like approval but it was leagues of progress when it came to changing their dynamic. There is a lot of trauma that gets passed along through generations and once we begin to identify the trauma we can then make steps to unlearn it. I thnk that was the most powerful message I got from the movie.