Marvelous and the Black Hole
“Sammy and Patricia tussle and yell with sheer physicality, occupying space in a way that young Chinese American women aren’t normally afforded in American media.”
Title: Marvelous and the Black Hole (2021)
Director: Kate Tsang 👩🏻🇺🇸
Writer: Kate Tsang 👩🏻🇺🇸
Reviewed by Li 👩🏻🇺🇸
Technical: 4/5
Growing up in the ‘90s, the word “representation” wasn’t really around; at least not in the media sense. All I knew was that I loved Tina Nguyen’s intrepid sleuthing in Ghostwriter on PBS and that I craved more scenes for Trini Kwan in Power Rangers. But today, jargon abounds for the trend of increasing visibility for marginalized groups, including the visibility of Asian Americans who make up one of the United States’ fastest growing demographics.
Enter Kate Tsang’s feature debut, Marvelous and the Black Hole. The 2020 winner of AT&T and Tribeca Film Festival’s Untold Stories fund made its Sundance appearance last weekend and in her director’s statement, Tsang says she made this film for “Asian American women who rarely get to see themselves as the leads in films.”
She nails the target. Even as we ride an influx of East Asian American filmmaking, with the high-profile Crazy Rich Asians (2018) clearing a fresh path for titles like Always Be My Maybe (2019) or Minari (2020) to follow, Marvelous and the Black Hole still feels like a balm to watch.
The film examines the grief of its 13-year-old protagonist Sammy Ko (Miya Cech), who has recently lost her mother and struggles to move on. Despite its heavy subject matter of death and self-harm, however, Tsang’s background in animation (Steven Universe, Adventure Time: Distant Lands) brings a playful levity that feels perfect for Sammy’s age. Delightful illustrations scratch and bloom across scenes, while Sammy escapes into theatrical daydreams that blend seamlessly with reality.
Sammy Ko rides a giant white rabbit in her black and white daydream
The entire film, in fact, feels polished and well-paced. But its chosen vehicle of an intergenerational friendship does encroach on familiar territory. Pixar’s Up (2009) or Driveways (2019) by Korean American director Andrew Ahn both feature young East Asian protagonists who befriend cantankerous old white men. Luckily, Tsang brings her own angle to the genre by flipping the personalities: Margot (Rhea Perlman) exhibits childlike irreverence as a magician and mentors an angsty teen who has had to grow up too soon.
Ultimately, Marvelous and the Black Hole vaults into a storytelling sweet spot. It’s fresh enough to be interesting, but accessible enough to provide comfort. The serious scenes work well, moving me to tears in moments, while the overall impression projects optimism and whimsy. How many debut films can boast such a splendid balancing act?
Gender: 5/5
Does it pass the Bechdel Test? YES
As mentioned in her director’s statement above, Tsang consciously made her movie for women. Accordingly, Marvelous and the Black Hole centers women through multiple relationships.
Sammy’s kinship with the older magician Margot drives the narrative, but her bond with elder sister Patricia (Kannon Omachi) feels no less realized. Tsang accomplishes so much with their limited scenes, breaking with tradition to present young Chinese American sisters as mischievous and loud, a privilege usually reserved for boys. Even as wonderful depictions of Asian American sisterhood proliferate, seen through the affection between three daughters in To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (2018) or Janine Kishi’s role as the comedic buzzkill to Claudia Kishi’s creative genius in The Baby-Sitters Club franchise, Sammy and Patricia deliver a force of presence that still feels unique. They tussle and yell with sheer physicality—a quietly radical move given the rarity of seeing young Asian women boldly occupy space with their bodies and voices. Remembering my own antics in middle school, holding screaming contests with my best friend or fighting with my two older sisters, I have to thank Tsang for reflecting that truth to wider audiences and dispelling the false notion that Asian women are somehow inherently demure.
Outside of Sammy’s powerfully rendered relationships with women like Margot or Patricia, her world reveals a realistic mix of women and men. Honestly, this shouldn’t be hard for any film to do, but it still speaks to the strength of Marvelous and the Black Hole that it so easily centers a female perspective while feeling unassuming. It doesn’t need to announce to the world that it’s feminist. You’ll find no cheesy props that telegraph its “wokeness,” no empty gestures of “strong women” who still need a man to motivate them. Instead, Marvelous and the Black Hole simply does the thing.
Race: 5/5
Marvelous and the Black Hole makes authenticity look easy. It helps that Tsang herself grew up between Hong Kong and the United States, making her film a matter of showcasing what she already knows rather than trying to speak for anyone else.
In fact, a glance at the films that do nail the “it factor” often enjoy this shorthand, such as Alice Wu’s The Half Of It (2020) or Kumail Nanjiani’s The Big Sick (2017). Tsang’s Marvelous and the Black Hole extends this positive trend.
No explicit overtures to Cantonese culture, such as food shots or spoken Cantonese, are ever tacked on. Instead, small nods to a uniquely Asian American experience involve carrying around a boba punch card or bringing Pocky to a party. The moments never feel over-explained and thus, reverberate that much louder. Better yet, Sammy doesn’t have to carry the full weight of Representation™ on her own. Patricia and their father, Angus Ko (Leonardo Nam), share multiple family scenes. And later in the film, a glimpse of their extended family passes quickly but still shows that Cantonese people exist as more than tokens.
Perhaps no other scene reveals the “less is more” truism than one that speeds by in less than 60 seconds. As Sammy first explores her interest in magic, she flips through an old book of tricks and lands on a page titled “Oriental Magic.” She pauses, frowning at the ink drawing of a Chinese man with a Qing dynasty-era queue, next to which a blurb reads, “Add some mystique to your act by performing as a silent conjurer from the Far East. Complete the look with a black wig and orange makeup.” Sammy’s disdainful reaction echoes ours, inviting audiences to laugh at the passage’s clear racism. Exotification, the stereotyping of Asians as “silent”, and instructions for how to apply yellowface all address past grievances of the Asian American community without needing to say a word aloud.
It’s clear that Tsang knows what she’s doing when it comes to telling the story of a small Chinese family in the Bay Area. But it’s important for a work to humanize all its underrepresented characters. To that end, Marvelous and the Black Hole casts inclusively for the role of Marianne, Angus’ new girlfriend played by Paulina Lule who is mixed-race Black. At first I worried she might be a simplistic character who never interacts with people outside of Angus, Sammy, or Patricia. But thankfully, towards the end of the film, we do see her own family. As the Kos and Marianne enjoy a party, an older Black man and white woman are smiling nearby, presumably Marianne’s parents. Their inclusion may be brief and wordless, but does go a long way to establish that Marianne has her own life outside of the Kos.
In minor roles, too, the makeup of Marvelous and the Black Hole’s populace feels on point for the Bay Area. The professor at Sammy’s community college (Keith Powell) sees multiple scenes as a Black man with corny dad jokes and heartwarming earnestness. The young children who excitedly watch Margot’s magic act represent a multitude of ethnicities, Black and Latinx and South Asian and multiracial, and perfectly in line with the growing diversity of younger Americans.
Bonus for Age: +1.00
At just over 70, Perlman gives a wonderful performance of Margot, a major character who defies the flattening caricatures that Hollywood often places on older adults. Margot displays infectious energy but also holds an undercurrent of her own sorrows and tragic backstory. Tsang admirably follows through on Margot’s journey so that she never feels like a one-note fairy godmother who exists solely to help her younger friend. For a media landscape that still underrepresents people over 60, and whose scant roles skew almost 75% male, Marvelous and the Black Hole happily helps to tip the scales in a more equal direction.
Mediaversity Grade: A+ 5.00/5
Tsang’s debut film never virtue signals. It simply sits in a world where women make up half the population, where the Bay Area has a sizable Chinese American population, and where women over 60 still have room to learn and grow. In short, it reflects reality. Combined with a genuine story that tackles death, depression, and self-harm with impressive lightness, and you have a recipe for something, well. Marvelous.
Like Marvelous and the Black Hole? Try these other coming-of-age titles featuring young Asian women.
Never Have I Ever - Season 1
To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (2018)
The Half Of It (2020)