The second annual ID Film Festival showcases films that challenge and celebrate what it means to be Asian.

Free for members; $5 non-members per program. Or you can buy a festival pass for $30. (Unless otherwise noted.) For more information about the festival, go to: www.idfilmfest.org.


Final Day of ID Film Festival
12 PM - Lovers on the Road (Directed by Jessey Tsang): US Premier. This film is part of our spotlight on Hong Kong Independent films

2 PM - Strawberry Fields (Directed by Rea Tajiri): This film is part of our Class of 1997 retrospective and is FREE.

4 PM - Japanese American Shorts Program

Half Kenneth (Directed by Ken Ochiai)

A Song for Ourselves (Directed by Tad Nakamura)

Pawns of the King (Directed by Ming Lai)

6 PM - Yellow (Directed byChris Chan Lee): This film is part of our Class of 1997 retrospective and is FREE.

8 PM - Shopping For Fangs (Directed by Quentin Lee & Justin Lin): This film is part of our Class of 1997 retrospective and is FREE. Preceding the feature is "Behind You" (Directed by Daric Loo).

10 PM - Closing Reception

MORE INFO ABOUT THESE FILMS: (By Gillian Sand)
LOVERS ON THE ROAD
Jessey Tsang’s first feature Lovers on the Road is a quietly observing portrait of a young Hong Kong woman who moves with her boyfriend to Beijing. In a foreign city, she explores the city alone while her boyfriend is at work. There is a sense of ennui and lost passion in her life. As she meets a young Japanese bohemian, the two possible young lovers set on a road trip together and reignite their passion to live.

Lovers on the Road is subtle in style and plot but rich in emotions and atmosphere. The film is most effective in portraying a displaced young woman’s internal landscape. Lovers on the Road also illuminates the identity crisis of a Hong Kong Chinese both emotionally and psychologically lost in mainland China. It is ironic that the main character finds solace in a Japanese national rather than a Chinese native, showing the unspeakable psychological distance between Hong Kong and China.

STRAWBERRY FIELDS
In this coming-of-age drama of a Japanese American teenage girl, the brilliant Suzy Nakamura plays a rebellious teenager, Irene, growing up in the 70s who faces identity crisis and growing pains. On the verge of a divorce, Suzy’s parents have spent time in the concentration camp and were very much traumatized by their experiences there.

Trapped and unhappy at home, Irene decides to hit the road with her handsome boyfriend (James Sie) to San Francisco and a soul-searching journey begins. The film is very much about memory, trauma and the Japanese American identity, a theme that filmmaker Rea Tajiri has previously explored in her famed experimental piece “History and Memory.” Intellectually engaging and emotionally moving, Strawberry Fields is poised to be a significant contribution in the cinema of Japanese Americans. Strawberry Fields was presented at the Venice Film Festival after its premiere at the 1997 San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival.

THREE JAPANESE AMERICAN SHORTS
“Half Kenneth” is a beautifully made period short drama about two HAPA adolescent brothers escaping from the concentration camp to look for their Caucasian mother. Filmmaker Ken Ochiai produced this short as an AFI thesis film.

“A Song for Ourselves” is a moving short documentary by upcoming filmmaker Tad Nakamura, celebrating the life and legacy of the late Asian-American musician-activist Chris Iijima. Showing the significant involvement of Asian Americans in the 60s’ civil rights movement, Ijima is an unsung hero of America’s progressive political movement.

Starring Sab Shimono, “Pawns of the King” is a short drama about a retired World War II Japanese Imperial Navy pilot playing a fateful game of chess against an old enemy, a retired U.S. Army 442nd solder, in the park. Filmmaker Ming Lai received the prestigious Panavision New Filmmaker Program grant and generous support from Kodak for the production of the short.

YELLOW
Sin works at his father’s grocery store in Koreatown as thugs rob the store and held Sin at gunpoint, taking $1,500. As Sin fears that his stern Korean father (Soon Tek Oh) will not let him go to college unless he gets the money back, his friends, an ensemble of Asian American teenagers, decide to help him recover the money as a wild night of action and drama ensues.

Showing the talents of new Asian American faces such as John Cho, Burt Bulos and Lela Lee, Yellow is the debut feature by Chris Chan Lee who went on to direct his second feature Undoing with yet a stellar Asian American cast. Yellow tells the coming-of-age story of an Asian American male that serendipitously mirrors that of an Asian American female in Rea Tajiri’s Strawberry Fields.

SHOPPING FOR FANGS
Probably the only cultish Asian American feature among the Class of 1997, Shopping for Fangs is the first feature co-directed by Quentin Lee and Justin Lin. Part comedy and part drama with a stylish thriller flare, Shopping for Fangs is quintessentially a postmodern collage that pays homage to 90s’ cinematic icons such as Wong Ka Wai and Quentin Tarantino.

Trapped in an unhappy marriage, Katherine, a housewife, is having sporadic black outs while Phil is having a hair problem that leads him to think that he’s turning into a werewolf. Toss into the mix are a wacky lesbian waitress in a blonde wig and a gay photographer (played by John Cho) who hang out at a San Gabriel Valley diner. These four quirky characters’ lives crisscross as this unexpected black comedy unfolds.

Preceding the feature is the horror short “Behind You” by Daric Loo, a fellow graduate of UCLA School of Film, Theater and Television with Quentin Lee and Justin Lin. “Behind You” is fun slasher short about a masked killer in a web chat.