A Chinese immigrant between a powder-keg romance with a skid-row punk in Baby, Don’t Cry. Baby (Zita Bai) is a 17-year-old Chinese immigrant in Seattle, who has a troubled home life with her mentally ill mother (Helen Sun), which she escapes by shooting home movies. One day Baby confronts 20-year-old drug dealer Fox (Vas Provatakis), in an attempt to get back a stolen camera. The two end up striking up a passionate romance and Baby is soon entrenched in a lifestyle of hard-partying nights, law-bending days, and codependent young love.
Baby, Don’t Cry is a coming-of-age drama written by and starring Zita Bai and directed by Jesse Dvorak. Bai’s protagonist of Baby starts off as a very quiet individual, who is the subject of bullying by girls at her school and abuse by her bipolar mother. This all changes when Baby meets Fox, a guy from the “wrong side of the tracks,” who despite possibly being a bit of a bad influence, helps Baby come into her own as an independent woman.
Zita Bai makes an interesting stylistic choice in her script for Baby, Don’t Cry by having her protagonist Baby not utter a single word until she encounters Fox, which seems to suggest how he helps her to open up. In fact, the film makes a lot of interesting stylistic choices, such as including the sounds of squealing pigs when Baby is subject to abuse by her mother. Overall, I would say that Baby, Don’t Cry is a solid indie coming-of-age drama, with just a dash of fantasy.
Baby, Don’t Cry streamed as part of the virtual 2021 Fantasia Film Festival
Related Links
- Baby Driver
- TIFF 2014: Bang Bang Baby
- BITS 2015: Night Cries
- Oscar Week ’08: Revisting Best Picture of 2004 – Million Dollar Baby
