Reconstructing Cultural and National Identities in the Contemporary Globalized World: Ethnicity, Sexuality, and Chinese Tradition in The Wedding Banquet

The Wedding Banquet, directed by Ang Lee, a Taiwanese-born director working primarily in the United States, was one of the most commercially successful films of 1993. It enjoyed success not only in Taiwan and other parts of East Asia, but also in the United States and other Western markets. In addition, it was one of the most critically acclaimed films of 1993, winning the prestigious Golden Bear award at the Berlin International Film Festival. This paper provides an in-depth analysis of the film by examining the tensions between homosexuality and Chinese patriarchal values. The paper also sheds light on the issues of Orientalism in the depiction of Asian men and explains the ways in which the character of Wai Tung challenges Western stereotypes regarding Asian and Asian American men that pervade American popular culture. In addition, it proffers a renewed interpretation of the film by adopting the concepts of transnational allegory and (re)territorialization, which places the film’s main characters into the political and economic contexts of the relations between Taiwan, mainland China, and the United States.