Tigertail review: Gentle and understated, a cross between The Joy Luck Club and Citizen Kane

How wonderful that Netflix gave director/writer Alan Yang the money to make this. It’s the story of a Taiwanese factory worker who marries a virtual stranger and moves to New York, partly because he wants to create a better life for his mum and partly because he’s watched so many romantic, thrilling American movies.

Tigertail is gentle and understated; at times, it borders on the prosaic. Its finale, though, delivers a gut-punch. Yang captures the perversity of human beings and does it with such tenderness that there’s nothing to do but cry.

We first meet Yang Pin-Jui as a lonely little boy, whose granny insists, ferociously, that tears solve nothing. As a twentysomething (Hong-Chi Lee), our hero is more jaunty, dancing with a gorgeous and sprightly soulmate to groovy/swoony music. Years later (now played by Tzi Ma), he has a prominent belly and wears an expression both bewildered and sour.

The film doesn’t settle in the past or the present. Instead, Yang weaves everything together, playing up the importance of the female characters. The end result is a cross between The Joy Luck Club and Citizen Kane. Yep, it’s a true original. Let’s hope the world pays note.