Film

The Farewell

Name: The Farewell
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Released: 2019
Cast: Awkwafina, Zhao Shuzhen, Hong Lu, Hong Lin, Tzi Ma

Family drama

A tender, funny, quietly devastating comedy about the lie a Chinese-American family tells to protect the grandmother they love: that she isn't dying. Lulu Wang shoots it with warmth rather than sentiment, letting Awkwafina's homecoming ache sit alongside wedding banquets and awkward toasts. It's for anyone who's ever felt like two different people in two different countries, and anyone who's ever loved someone enough to lie to them.

TMDb rating

3.7

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you want a quietly funny, tender family story where big feelings sit under small talk, and you're happy to let a gentle observational tone do the work.

Skip it if you need plot momentum or big set pieces, as it moves through unhurried domestic scenes with restrained humour that can feel slight if you want more drive.

What it asks of you: Patience for long, quiet stretches of meals and small talk, with a light touch that lingers in the family's hesitations, asking you to sit with them rather than hurry.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Minari2021

The same unhurried tenderness toward an immigrant family finding its footing, this time a Korean-American household in rural Arkansas. Quiet, specific, and devastating in small moments rather than big speeches.

But Very slow pace and low-key drama; if you wanted more comedy alongside the ache, this leans almost entirely into ache.

The Big Sick2017

A family closes ranks around a hospital bed and a cultural divide, with the same instinct to protect through omission rather than honesty. Warmer and more overtly funny, but built on the same tender dishonesty.

But It's a romantic comedy first, so the illness plot is scaffolding rather than the emotional center.

Lady Bird2017

Greta Gerwig's mother-daughter push-pull has the same specificity and generosity toward difficult, loving people. If Nai Nai and Billi's dynamic moved you, this scratches a similar itch from another angle.

But No terminal illness, no family conspiracy — it's a coming-of-age film, gentler stakes throughout.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from The Farewell

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Tokyo Story1953

Both films find their grief in what family members refuse to say to each other's faces, using ritual and formality as a way to survive it.

Ozu's masterpiece about aging parents visiting their grown children, told with the same patient stillness and unbearable politeness masking real feeling. It basically invented this kind of quiet family devastation.

But Black and white, 1950s pacing, almost no plot in the conventional sense — a real test of patience for some viewers.

Everything Everywhere All at Once2022

Another Chinese immigrant family drama hiding inside genre clothing, wrestling with generational silence, unspoken grief, and what you owe the people who raised you. Awkwafina's a producer here too, oddly enough — but the connective tissue is Ke Huy Quan and Michelle Yeoh's family.

But It's a maximalist multiverse action-comedy; the tonal whiplash is the opposite of The Farewell's stillness.

Everything Everywhere All at Once poster

Departures2008

A Japanese film about a man who becomes a ritual undertaker, and how a culture handles death with formality, tenderness, and unexpected humor. Similar interest in the ceremonies we build around loss.

But Slower and more meditative, with subtitles and a plot about a profession rather than a family.

The Joy Luck Club1993

The genre touchstone for Chinese-American mother-daughter stories, sweeping across generations and continents. If you want the granddaddy of this particular ache, start here.

But Melodramatic by today's standards, with a structure that jumps between four families and can feel overstuffed.

Crazy Rich Asians2018

Same year, same diaspora tensions between American individualism and Asian family duty, but dialed up into glossy romantic comedy. A fun, lighter companion piece if you want the same themes without the grief.

But Broad, glamorous, and crowd-pleasing where The Farewell is intimate — almost a tonal opposite despite the overlap.

Columbus2017

A quiet indie about two people orbiting a dying parent, full of stillness, architecture, and conversations that say less than they mean. Similar patience and trust in silence.

But Extremely slow and dialogue-driven; some will find it inert rather than meditative.

Tigertail2020

Alan Yang's underseen film about a Taiwanese immigrant looking back on the family and choices he left behind. Melancholy, understated, thematically a close cousin.

But Less narrative momentum and a colder emotional register; it doesn't hit as hard as it should.

Dick Johnson Is Dead2020

Both are about families literally constructing a fiction around death — staging events, controlling the story — as the only bearable way to face it.

A documentary filmmaker stages her father's death in elaborate, absurd ways while he's still alive with dementia, turning denial into a strange act of love and control. Funnier and sadder than it has any right to be.

But The meta, performative structure is unusual and some will find the staged-death conceit uncomfortable rather than moving.

Death at a Funeral2007

Strip out the grief and what's left is the same engine: a family event where everyone's managing secrets, performances, and each other's feelings at once.

A British farce where a family gathering for a funeral spirals into chaos, secrets, and slapstick. Same premise — everyone lying and performing for the sake of the occasion — cranked into pure comedy.

But Broad, silly, occasionally crude; it has none of The Farewell's emotional restraint or ache.