LA Asian Pacific Film Festival 2017

33rd Annual Asian Pacific Film Festival
April 27 - May 4, 2017 - Little Tokyo - Koreatown - West Hollywood

VC proudly celebrates 33 years as Southern California’s largest and most prestigious film festival of its kind.  The LAAPFF launches the pre-celebration of Asian Pacific Heritage Month through this year’s slate of over 180 films from both Asian Pacific American and Asian international artists.  For over three decades, the Festival has presented close to 4,000 films by Asian Pacific American and Asian international talent.  This year, a record number 45 feature films and 139 shorts from over 750 submissions will be showcased throughout the eight-day fest.

This year’s Film Festival represents the growing multitude of talent from this diverse creative community, and serves as a reminder of how the Asian American film community continues to thrive and inspire.  With terms like “whitewashing” and “inclusion” being at the forefront of discussions in Hollywood, the festival takes on not only presenting the best of Asian American film, but also the mission of inspiring new filmmakers/storytellers to create, while taking a retro look at the beginnings of a global cinematic genre.   Stories by women, men, LGBTQ artists, seniors, youth, Asian Pacific American, Asian international, and a multitude of ethnicities are all being shared throughout the Festival.

This year’s opening night kicking off the Fest is the 15th Anniversary special gala presentation of director/writer Justin Lin’s uncut 35mm Sundance original version of the landmark film BETTER LUCK TOMORROW.  Director Lin will present this rarely-seen version of the film that launched his career at Sundance 2002, when it was championed by the late iconic film critic, Roger Ebert, and then having MTV FILMS and Paramount Classics pick it up for theatrical distribution nationwide.  The film features Asian American film actors starring in lead roles including John Cho, Sung Kang, Jason Tobin, Roger Fan, Parry Shen, and Karin Anna Cheung. 

Members of the cast and crew will be in attendance for Q/A following the celebratory screening.  BETTER LUCK TOMORROW screens Opening Night April 27 at 7PM at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood.

The Festival Centerpiece Presentation features the 2017 Sundance Film Festival Audience Award winning film – GOOK – from actor turned filmmaker JUSTIN CHON.  This vibrant and insightful film takes place on April 29, 1992 in Los Angeles – the day the Rodney King verdict was announced and the infamous L.A. Riots began.  Chon’s film centers on Eli and Daniel, two Korean American brothers, who own a struggling shoe store and have an unlikely friendship with Kamilla, a street-wise 11 year old African American girl.  It’s just another typical day at the store until the Rodney King verdict is read and riots break out through the city. With the chaos moving towards them, the trio is forced to defend the store while contemplating the future of their own personal dreams and the true meaning of family.

GOOK will be presented on Saturday, April 29 at the Aratani Theatre at the JACCC in Little Tokyo – Downtown Los Angeles.  The festival is commemorating the 25^th Anniversary of the L.A. Uprising/Rodney King verdict with this gala screening featuring the filmmaker, crew and cast.  This screening will top off a day of films, events, community discussions and art presentations memorializing this historic Los Angeles event.

Closing out this year’s eight day film celebration is the Los Angeles premiere of the acclaimed 2017 Sundance hit film COLUMBUS from director Kogonada – a proud immigrant, born in Seoul and raised in the Midwest.   This beautiful and engaging feature directorial debut stars John Cho, Haley Lu Richardson, Parker Posey, Rory Culkin and Michelle Forbes.  The film centers on Casey (Richardson) who lives with her mother in a little-known Mid-western town haunted by the promise of modernism. Jin (Cho), a visitor from the other side of the world, attends to his dying father. Burdened by the future, they find respite in one another and the architecture that surrounds them. 

COLUMBUS screens on May 4 at the Directors Guild of America in West Hollywood with the filmmaker along with his cast and crew in attendance for post screening Q/A. 

For the first time ever, the LAAPFF will present a Grand Jury Award for Outstanding Asian International documentary and narrative feature. The line up of these award-nominated documentaries and features include:

Documentary Features

• MOTHERLAND Dir.: Ramona S. Diaz
• PLASTIC CHINA Dir.: Wang Jiu-liang
• SMALL TALK Dir.: Huang Hui-Chen
• TOKYO IDOLS Dir.: Kyoko Miyake

Narrative Features

• BY THE TIME IT GETS DARK Dir.: Anocha Suwichakornpong
• DIAMOND ISLAND Dir: Davy Chou
• KING OF PEKING Dir.: Sam Voutas
• POP AYE Dir.: Kristen Tan
• RESEBA – THE DARK WIND Dir.: Hussein Hassan
• THE ROAD TO MANDALAY Dir.: Midi Z
• SAVING SALLY Dir.: Avid Liongoren
• THE SOUL OF THE TIGER Dir.: François Yang
• THE SOWER Dir.: Yosuke Takeuchi
• TAXI STORIES Dir.: Doris Yeung
• TURN LEFT TURN RIGHT Dir.: Douglas Seok

Further, on the international landscape, the LAAPFF will present spotlight programs on the current wave of important Taiwanese Cinema and Southeast Asian Cinema adding to the ever budding global cinema landscape.

• SPOTLIGHT ON TAIWAN The Ministry of Culture, Republic of China (Taiwan) and Taiwan Academy in Los Angeles joins the Festival to present “Spotlight on Taiwan”, a spotlight on Taiwanese cinema offerings programmed during the week.

• TIGERS ROAR The “Tigers Roar” program focuses on Southeast Asian Cinema with film screenings at the Fest and partnering with the two-day ASEAC-SEARCN LA Conference at UCLA.

• FILM – SPECIAL PRESENTATIONS – this amazing selection of special film presentations include award winning features from across the globe highlighting stories, issues and filmmakers that are pushing the boundaries. These include:

ABACUS: SMALL ENOUGH TO JAIL – Dir. Steve James 

JOSHUA: TEENAGER VS. SUPERPOWER – Dir. Joe Piscatella 

RELOCATION: ARKANSAS-AFTERMATH OF INCARCERATION – Dir. Vivienne Schiffer 

RE:ORIENTATIONS – Dir. Richard Fung 

THREE SASSY SISTERS – Dir. Nia Dinata 

YELLOW – Dir. Chris Chan Lee (20th Anniversary Screening) 

• BRONZEVILLE, LITTLE TOKYO 

• FLASH POINT 2017 – TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AFTER THE LOS ANGELES UPRISING 

This year’s 33rd LAAPFF competition line-up for Grand Jury Awards for North American feature films is rich with stories and insights from important and nuanced perspectives from creative talent across the spectrum.

COMPETITION NARRATIVES

• CARDINAL X Dir.: Angie Wang
• CHEE AND T Dir.: Tanuj Chopra
• COLUMBUS Dir.: Kogonada
• GOOK Dir.: Justin Chon
• I CAN I WILL I DID Dir.: Nadine Truong
• THE LOCKPICKER Dir.: Randall Okita
• NORMAN JONES Dir.: Mike Sakamoto
• WEXFORD PLAZA Dir.: Joyce Wong
• WINDOW HORSES Dir.: Ann Marie Fleming

COMPETITION DOCUMENTARIES 

• 95 AND 6 TO GO Dir.: Kimi Takesue
• A TIME TO SWIM Dir.: Ashley Duong
• FINDING KUKAN Dir.: Robin Lung
• GHOST MAGNET ROACH MOTEL Dir.: Shinpei Takeda
• MELE MURALS Dir.: Tadashi Nakamura
• MIXED MATCH Dir.: Jeff Chiba Stearns
• RESISTANCE AT TULE LAKE Dir.: Konrad Aderer
• SAVE MY SEOUL Dir.: Jason Y. Lee
• UNBROKEN GLASS Dir.: Dinesh Sabu
• WHO IS ARTHUR CHU? Dirs.: Yu Gu and Scott Drucker

After Closing Night on May 4 in Los Angeles, the Festival will continue with a Festival Encore Program May 5 through 11 in Buena Park at the brand new CGV Buena Park 8 with encore screenings of select Film Festival films; and a special slate of works by award-winning filmmakers on the recent achievements in Vietnamese cinema. Check the Festival website for this schedule.

For program information, and to purchase tickets, please visit festival.vconline.org.