East Side Sushi (2014)

So you know when Netflix is going to take down underrated films and they warn you? East Side Sushi will only be on Netflix until March 13 and if you haven’t seen it yet you should go watch it RIGHT NOW!

East Side Sushi is the story of a Mexican mother and very talented chef named Juana(Diana Elizabeth Torres) who finds a passion for sushi during her time working at a Japanese restaurant. Juana is someone who had only ever tried supermarket sushi. When she reluctantly tries real, fresh, raw sushi for the first time, she is completely overtaken by the artform of sushi. She gets hired to work as a dish cleaner and table busser, however, she quickly rises through the ranks of the kitchen and begins to long for the life of a true sushi chef.

Juana experiments at home with her picky father and daughter by implementing Mexican ingredients into the traditional sushi form. When Juana is faced with adversity not only for her race but her gender as well, she attempts to prove her sushi-making skills through a local sushi chef competition. This story about inclusion in professional culinary workspaces is a nearly perfect diversity watch.

Not only is East Side Sushi about a woman working towards acceptance in a male lead field, but about one underrepresented group learning about and supporting another extremely underrepresented group in the workplace.

Diana Elizabeth Torres as Juana was amazingly strong and captivating.

In the role of a hardworking single mother, Torres represents a community that is often misrepresented in film. She was not interested in finding a man to help her provide for her elderly father or her child, instead, she is motivated to find a field she is passionate about in order to provide for her family.