How to Have an American Baby is a kaleidoscopic voyage into the shadow economy catering to Chinese tourists who travel to the US to give birth for citizenship. Told through a series of intimately observed vignettes, the story of a hidden global economy emerges–depicting the fortunes and tragedies that befall the ordinary people caught in its web. A Co-Presentation with Chasing the Dream, a public media initiative from The WNET Group.
Nicolas Rapold, Screen SlateLeslie Tai’s deeply embedded look at both the client and business-owner side of the transaction only grows more complicated as it continues, perhaps no more so than when portraying the United States as almost incidental to the purposes of its subjects… [The film] left one with a welter of feelings, and not always knowing what to think—which is a good thing.