It comes to Prime Video: Expats, the new series from Nicole Kidman

What is it about?

Set against the vibrant and turbulent tapestry of Hong Kong in 2014, “Expats” follows three Americans – Margaret, Hilary and Mercy – whose lives intersect after a sudden family tragedy. The series questions privilege and explores what happens when the line between victimhood and guilt becomes blurred.

The Immigrants, a TV series created and directed by Lulu Wang with Nicole Kidman, Sarayu Blue, Ji-Young Yoo…

who is he with

Nicole Kidman is back in the prestigious mini-series. She plays Margaret, whose life is shattered the day her youngest son goes missing during a festive stroll through a Hong Kong night market.

He, who then had a dream life – a perfect family and a luxurious apartment – is devastated by this loss and the constant question of where his son is.

Sarayu Blue – recently seen in My First Times – plays Hilary, Margaret’s neighbor and best friend. He also faces difficulties in his personal life. Her marriage to David (Jack Huston) is on the rocks because David has a drinking problem and unlike Hilary, wants to have a child.

Their lives change the day Mercy (Ji-Young Yoo, found in The Sky Is Everywhere) crosses their path. He had just graduated from Columbia and decided to move to Hong Kong for a fresh start.

Without a real job, Mercy meets Margaret one day on a cruise. He offers to play babysitting for his children. And he’s the one who loses his son, Gus, in five seconds of carelessness while out at the night market.

Also, with Mercy, David will have an affair that will further damage his marriage to Hilary. As for Brian Tee (Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift), he plays Clark, Margaret’s husband.

Is it worth checking out?

Expats is a moving family tragedy. Over the course of six episodes, we follow three women who deal as best they can with this fate that destroys their lives. Although this situation can fall into the trap of melodrama, as we often see, Lulu Wang, the creator and director, deliberately took a different path.

We first get to know these women in all their strengths and weaknesses – immersing the audience in the city around them – before a devastating event is revealed at the end of the second episode, around which the narrative revolves – even if we guess from the beginning. What to talk about without seeing all the contours.

The Chinese-American director, who made his name with The Farewell, decided from the start that the series’ driving force would be the three women at its heart, as opposed to the more sensational aspects of the story.

But the real success is not making these women into heroines that you sympathize with despite the tragedies they go through.

Margaret, of course, is obsessed with her son’s disappearance, but to the point of abandoning her other two children and her husband. His obsession almost turns into psychosis. Hillary is a rich woman who looks down on everyone. And Mercy looks to herself a lot, justifying all her failures with the pseudo-curse of which she is the object.

The Immigrants then become quite fascinating character studies for those who admit to not liking the characters and seeing them develop through the adversity of life, with all their flaws.

others…

We also have to highlight the special 5th episode, which lasts 96 minutes, where Margaret, Hilary and Mercy are only extras. Lulu Wang then turns her camera to a community of Filipina domestic workers (or helpers, as they are euphemistically called by well-to-do women) who gather in city parks and public spaces on their days off to chat and get updates about their families back home. .

Then we get the pulse of the real Hong Kong, far from its ultra-safe ghettos and luxury apartments without any personality. The immigrants then set foot in a place where Hong Kong demonstrations are brutally repressed by the police, where a young local who has befriended Mercy lives in a small apartment with her parents, brothers and sisters, and her grandmother, where her mother. Another friend of Mercy’s continues to work in what she hopes will be support for her son’s future…

Then we notice the performance of Ruby Ruiz, who plays Essie, Margaret’s “helper”, the children’s actual surrogate mother. This little piece of woman, already worn by age, reveals all her humanity in the company of this family that takes her for granted even though she sacrifices everything for them.

We then realize that Margaret, Hilary and Mercy are not the most interesting. All this is the shadow that passes silently and is always ignored.

The first two episodes of Expats are currently available on Prime Video.