When I was in seventh grade, I asked my parents if I could shave the black fuzz above my lip. By then, kids had already been making fun of me for over a year. My parents warned me - once I started shaving, it would grow back worse. I’d always have to be shaving. I was terrified of my own mustache. This scene plays out almost exactly in Mustache. And somewhere between that scene, the genius representations of IM conversations, and the beautiful stylization, I fell in love with this film.I adored this film. It feels like it could lead the next generation of films about immigrant families. The parents and community members were layered and nuanced. The kids struggle with identity in a multi-dimensional way. And no one is reduced to simple tropes. I cried multiple times watching this. One of those times was simply seeing Ilyas get invited to go off campus for lunch. I remember that moment exactly! How incredible and affirming it felt to experience the freedom of an off campus lunch from high school. Seeing that scene made me realize that this film is an incredible story about immigrant families, but it’s also an incredible encapsulation of being a minority in a public high school. It’s easy to reduce high school experiences to the lunchroom clique scenes. But it was so much more than that for me. So much more complex. The subtle racism existed alongside the first tastes of freedom existed alongside the joy of finding a creative voice. What a beautiful film. Watching this with my mom on the eve of moving to LA for a dream screenwriting job, I felt seen and alive and filled with the aspiration to make something this heartfelt and brilliant. I can’t wait for this to find an audience, and I can’t wait to watch it again and again. SXSW #5
