South Asian Spotlight
Oct 16, 03:43 PM by administrator
Program 8: South Asian Spotlight
Sat. Nov. 8th, 7:00 PM
In South Asia, the game and film industry have become huge. Talent is only certain to grow, and we’re pleased to present a few up and coming South Asian filmmakers. A symbolic look at a child, and their view of their world and the people close to them, are portrayed in two animated shorts, AMMA and KEY TUMI? Then KISSING COUSINS is a hilarious journey of a man who ends relationships for a living, only to ironically yearn for one with a special woman…but with a catch.
Kissing Cousins
Director/Writer: Amyn Kaderali | Producers: Amyn Kaderali, Manish Goyal, Rahul Haria
Narrative | DigiBeta | Colour | 2007 | 98 minutes | USA
Amir (Samrat Chakrabarti), 29, is a heartbreaker. Literally. As a “relationship termination specialist,” providing “dumping services” for disgruntled daters, Amir spends his days delivering bad news to unsuspecting lovers across Los Angeles and retrieving his clients’ belongings. When Amir returns to his family’s Bay Area home for Thanksgiving, he is reunited with Zara (Rebecca Hazelwood), his charming and beautiful cousin from Britain who he has not seen in twenty years. An undercurrent of sexual tension develops between them as the charade comes dangerously close to going too far. Will his friends find out the truth? Will Amir fall for his own cousin?! Or will he become one of his own “victims?”
Previous Screenings: SF Int’l Asian American Film Festival, Indian Film Festival of LA, Int’l Film Festival of Mumbai, LA Asian Pacific Film Festival
Western Canadian Premiere
Director In Attendance
preceded by:
Amma
Director/Writer/Producer: Aparna Kapur
Animation | DigiBeta | Colour | 2007 | 6 minutes | India
Amma is a poetic narration of a young girl’s life and her deeply rooted relationship with her grandmother. The film explores the deep symbiotic relationship between the child and her grandmother and how their love for one another surpasses this physical world.
Director In Attendance
Key Tumi?
Director/Writer/Producer: Kunal Sen
Animation | Beta SP | Colour | 2008 | 7 minutes | India/Canada
Caramel custard, ping pong and potty all play an important role in this charming animation about a young Indian boy exploring where he came from as he prepares for the performance of a lifetime. ‘Key Tumi?’ is an attempt at posing a modern idiom for the contemporary Indian family.
Previous Screenings: Toronto International Film Festival
Western Canadian Premiere | Director In Attendance
Flaunt It Party
Oct 16, 03:43 PM by administrator
FLAUNT IT PARTY
Saturday Nov. 8th, 9:00PM – 1:00AM
- $15 advance/$25 door
Stadium Club at Edgewater Casino
750 Pacific Boulevard South (Plaza of Nations)
Hosted by explorASIAN
Special Kirin Beer Tasting (Courtesy of Select Wine Merchants) for VIP Passholders
Complimentary admission for ladies who FLAUNT IT by wearing Asian traditional dress.
Celebrate the Western Canada Premiere of KISSING COUSINS at Edgewater Casino’s Stadium Club.
If you got it – FLAUNT IT! Join us for one of the Festival’s most anticipated events. Your VAFF VIP Pass gets you priority access into Stadium Club where you’ll be able to mix and mingle with filmmakers, celebrities and other special guests.
Featuring the cool mix sounds of DJ D-Jhun – one of the freshest DJ’s in Vancouver. Originally from the Philippines, D-Jhun has been in the Vancouver DJ scene for almost 2 years. You will catch D-Jhun spinning @ Fabric Nightclub, Shine Nightclub, Century House Lounge, Mint Nightclub, Waldorf Hotel and at private parties. He is a resident DJ for Icon Nights Promotion, Gxotique Production, and Slingshot Entertainment that he co-founded. Slingshot Entertainment is known to the Filipino Youth Community for organizing private parties and hip hop events such as ‘Double Up Christmas Party’, ‘Independence Night Party’ and ’3 Stars And A Sun’.
Why go to just any nightclub tonight when you can party like a VAFF Star at Stadium Club!
Please note that there are a limited number of tickets available at the door – subject to venue capacity. We strongly recommend getting your tickets in advance!
Must be 19 years or older to attend VIP GALA – ID may be requested.
No refunds or exchanges on special event tickets or general admission tickets except in the event of program cancellation.
Encore: Ping Pong Playa
Oct 16, 03:43 PM by administrator
Program 9: Encore Presentation
Sat. Nov. 8th, 9:30 PM
Sport and culture, charm and comedy open this 12th annual Vancouver Asian Film Festival. We are thrilled to welcome back director Jessica Yu, a VAFF alum from our very first Festival, with her hilarious feature film debut, PING PONG PLAYA. Jessica has been often and affectionately quoted for her 1997 Oscar acceptance speech for Best Short Subject Documentary: “What a thrill – you know you’ve entered new territory when your outfit cost more than your film.” And opening the program is Jason Karman’s fond reminder of Vancouver’s famous “yo-yo playa,” Harvey Lowe, in the short STATE OF YO.
Ping Pong Playa
Director: Jessica Yu | Producers: Anne Clements, Joan Huang | Writers: Jessica Yu, Jimmy Tsai
Narrative | 35mm | Colour | 2007 | 96 minutes | USA
Christopher “C-dub” Wong (Jimmy Tsai) is a suburban guy who sports an urban swagger, waxes political on all things Asian American, and clings to pipe dreams of a career as a pro basketball player. Blaming genetics for his failure to make the NBA, C-dub lives at home, works a dead-end job, and squirms in the shadow of his older brother, Michael (Roger Fan), a doctor – and a ping pong champion.
With a family-run ping pong equipment store and a mom who teaches it at the local Chinese Community Center, the Wang’s entire world revolves around the sport. But despite the family legacy, C-dub opts to spend his free time playing videogames and daydreaming about get-rich quick schemes with his best friend JP Money (Khary Payton).
A car accident in the family forces C-dub to take over his mom’s ping pong class of misfits. But he soon discovers the benefits of ping pong – earning some extra money on the side and happily befriends one of the kids – who happens to have a beautiful older sister.
But when the Wang family livelihood is threatened by a rival ping pong player’s attempt to lure away the young students, C-dub begins to focus seriously on the upcoming National Golden Cock Tournament and defend his family’s ping pong dynasty.
Previous Screenings: Toronto Int’l Film Festival 2007, San Francisco Int’l Asian American Film Festival 2008
Canadian Premiere
preceded by:
State Of Yo
Director/Writer/Producer: Jason Karman
Documentary | Beta SP | Colour | 2008 | 8 minutes | Canada
Harvey Lowe won the first yo-yo championship in 1932. In his life, he’s experienced the early loss of his father, political and economic unrest, and a brain tumour. The yo-yo, which made him famous, helped him regain his identity.
Previous Screenings: New Cineworks 2008 official selection, Los Angeles Asian Film Festival 2008
Director In Attendance
Industry Luncheon
Oct 16, 03:41 PM by administrator
INDUSTRY LUNCHEON
Sunday Nov. 9th, 11:30AM – 1:00PM
- $15 advance/$20 door
Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden
578 Carrall Street, Chinatown
Hosted by Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden and National Film Board of Canada
Join our Festival filmmakers and Industry guests for an informal luncheon in a most serene setting where we will announce this year’s winner of the NFB Best Canadian Short Film Award at VAFF.
The Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden, the first of its kind outside of China, is an authentic representation of an age old garden tradition that reached its peak in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). The Garden is characteristic of the private spaces within a Ming scholar’s residence. With its asymmetrical arrangement of rocks and plants, its winding paths and corridors, and the vistas that overlook its courtyards, the Garden emulates the rhythms of nature. Ming dynasty scholars, the elite of their time, lived and worked in their garden, sharing these enchanting spaces with friends and family of all ages. Like any home, a scholar’s garden was filled with energy, but also offered quiet moments for contemplation. The golden glow of the autumn sun illuminates a dazzling array of maple and gingko leaves in vibrant shades of red, yellow, and orange.
Your Industry Luncheon ticket or VAFF VIP Pass includes free admission ($10 value) to Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden.
Please note that there are a limited number of tickets available at the door – subject to venue capacity. We strongly recommend getting your tickets in advance!
No refunds or exchanges on special event tickets or general admission tickets except in the event of program cancellation.
Our Fair City
Oct 16, 03:40 PM by administrator
Program 10: Our Fair City – Local Truth
Sun. Nov. 9th, 1:30 PM
Open up any of the local papers around town and discover Vancouver has her share of sordid stories which lead to dramatic headlines. These local documentaries dig deeper past the sensationalism to explore the complicated people behind the sound bites. SCHOOL OF SECRETS exposes a Vancouver teacher’s systemic seduction of his students and how it affected them as grown women. WARRIOR BOYZ examines South Asian gangs and the youth attracted to the violent lifestyle.
School Of Secrets
Director/Writer: Melanie Wood | Producer: Eunice Lee
Documentary | DigiBeta | Colour | 2007 | 60 minutes | Canada
SCHOOL OF SECRETS, a documentary by Vancouver filmmakers Melanie Wood and Eunice Lee, presents a tale of truth – and its consequences – in the story of a Vancouver teacher and the teenage girls he seduced. Kept secret for decades, it’s a story that, when finally exposed, stunned the community.
Previous Screenings: CBC – “The Lens”
Warrior Boyz
Director/Writer: Baljit Sangra | Producers: Baljit Sangra, Cari Green, Selwyn Jacob (NFB)
Documentary | DigiBeta | Colour | 2008 | 43 minutes | Canada
Looking at some of the challenges that South Asian youth are facing today, WARRIOR BOYZ sets out to understand why they are vulnerable to the allure of gang culture. In the past decade over a hundred Indo-Canadian youth have been killed as a result of gang violence. Most of the victims came from middle class families within a tight knit community. This documentary follows two teenagers over a semester in a predominately South Asian school in a suburb to find out why youth continue to be vulnerable to this lifestyle.
Previous Screenings: DOXA Documentary Festival
Pawns of Politics
Oct 16, 03:38 PM by administrator
Program 11: The Pawns Of Politics
Sun. Nov. 9th, 4:00 PM
History repeats itself all too often, and sometimes when that happens, the consequences can strike at the core of a family, or a whole community – or an entire culture. However, in the end, the resilience of people and their commitment to their community prevail against all odds. In David Yun’s THE PAIN OF BEING THIRSTY, wartime policies today are eerily mirrored by the past disregard of freedoms and rights. KORYO SARAM: THE UNRELIABLE PEOPLE, is a survival story of how Soviet Koreans were forced into harsh exile but ultimately thriving today with their culture intact. And in VINCENT WHO?, a movement of social and cultural activism emerges from a travesty of justice.
The Pain With Being Thirsty
Director/Producer: David Yun | Writer: Babar Ahmad
Experimental | Beta SP | Colour | 2007 | 6 minutes | USA
A film that juxtaposes found footage of Japanese Internment camps in Arizona with a found letter written by a Muslim prisoner accused of running Al-Qaeda websites and awaiting extradition to Guantanamo Bay. In linking the two, the film traces a connection between the way Japanese Americans were perceived during World War II and how Arabs and Arab Americans are being treated in a post-9/11 world while raising larger questions about the fragility of our own freedoms.
Previous Screenings: Int’l Asian American Film Festival (NY), Int’l Documentary Festival Amsterdam, European Media Arts Festival
Koryo Saram: The Unreliable People
Directors: Y. David Chung, Matt Dibble | Producer:* Y. David Chung | Writers: Japhet Asher, Meredith Jung-En Woo, Y. David Chung
Documentary | Beta SP | Colour | 2007 | 60 minutes | USA | Russian and Korean, with English subtitles
In 1937, Stalin began a campaign of massive ethnic cleansing and forcibly deported everyone of Korean origin living in the coastal provinces of the Far East Russia near the border of North Korea to the unsettled steppe country of Central Asia 3,700 miles away.
Koryo Saram (the Soviet Korean phrase for Korean person) tells the harrowing saga of survival and the sweep of Soviet history through the eyes of these 180,000 deported Koreans, who were designated by Stalin as an “unreliable people” and enemies of the state. Through recently uncovered archival footage and new interviews, the film follows the deportees’ history of integrating into the Soviet system while working under punishing conditions in Kazakhstan, a country which became a concentration camp of exiled people from throughout the Soviet Union.
Previous Screenings: San Francisco Int’l Asian American Film Festival 2007, Asian American Showcase, Toronto Reel Asian Int’l Film Festival – NFB Best Doc Award
Canadian Premiere | Director In Attendance
Vincent Who?
Directors: Tony Lam, Curtis Chin | Producer: Curtis Chin
Documentary | Beta SP | Colour | 2007 | 41 minutes | USA
In 1982, Vincent Chin was brutally murdered in Detroit by two white autoworkers at the height of anti-Japanese sentiments. The judge, however, sentenced the killers to a mere $3,000 fine, three years probation, and no jail time. This decision galvanized Asian Americans around the country to unite for the first time across ethnic and socioeconomic lines to form a real pan-Asian community and movement. The multiple legacies and the impact of the case on the Asian American community is explored through interviews with key players from 25 years ago as well as with a whole new generation of activists.
Canadian Premiere
Closing Night: West 32nd
Oct 16, 03:38 PM by administrator
Closing Night
Sun. Nov. 9th, 7:00 PM
Our Festival closes with VAFF 2005 alum Michael Kang’s second feature film, WEST 32ND. John Cho and Jun Kim star in this story about an ambitious lawyer who finds himself thrust into a sordid world of hard realities and moral compromises. Also featuring Vancouver talent, Grace Park, WEST 32ND takes us inside New York’s gritty Koreantown underworld. Preceding is the stylish PERMUTE, about an animated woman caught within a film noir setting and the journey within.
West 32nd
Director: Michael Kang | Producers: Teddy Zee, Miky Lee | Writers: Michael Kang, Edmund Lee
Narrative | DigiBeta | Colour | 2007 | 91 minutes | USA
When John (John Cho), an ambitious young lawyer, takes on a pro bono case to exonerate a fourteen year-old boy from a first-degree murder charge, he finds a world he never knew existed in the underbelly of Manhattan.
Infiltrating the knotty and complex realm of organized crime to search for clues, he meets his match, Mike (Jun Kim), a rising soldier in the syndicate. Recognizing John’s determination and daring, Mike brings John into his confidence, furtively drawing him into his own plans to rise within the underworld. Though they become fast friends, they just as quickly end up trying to use each other as they discover they’ll both do anything to win.
Previous Screenings: Tribeca Film Festival, Pusan Int’l Film Festival, DisOrient Asian American Film Festival, Newport Beach Int’l Film Festival, San Francisco Int’l Asian Film Festival
Canadian Premiere | Grace Park in Attendance
preceded by:
Permute
Director/Writer/Producer: Lydia Fu
Animation | Beta SP | B&W | 2008 | 5 minutes | Canada
Our existential heroine, Lulu, attempts to discover a cryptic fate that she is only able to discover through the oblique vignettes of a film noir cityscape.
Director In Attendance
Closing Night Party
Oct 16, 03:37 PM by administrator
CLOSING NIGHT WRAP PARTY
Sunday Nov. 9th, 9:00PM – 1:00AM
- $10 advance/$15 door
Tunnel Multi-Lounge
622 West Pender Street, Vancouver
Join us at TUNNEL after attending the Canadian Premiere of WEST 32ND. Dance the night away to hot urban mixes spun by Tunnel’s own DJ.
Celebrate the four days of exceptional films, brilliant filmmakers and memorable events that make up the 12th Vancouver Asian Film Festival. Enjoy exotic sips and chill out at Vancouver’s newest hotspot where vintage meets sophisticated sound and light technology. With its sleek interiors and amazing luxurious lounge, VAFF’s Wrap Party at TUNNEL will set the scene for a spectacular closing evening for all Festival attendees, visiting celebrities, filmmakers, and staff.
And don’t forget – your VAFF VIP Pass gets you in the door first!
Please note that there are a limited number of tickets available at the door – subject to venue capacity. We strongly recommend getting your tickets in advance!
Must be 19 years or older to attend VIP GALA – ID may be requested.
No refunds or exchanges on special event tickets or general admission tickets except in the event of program cancellation.
Closing Night Encore: West 32nd
Oct 16, 03:35 PM by administrator
Program 13: Closing Night Encore
Sun. Nov. 9th, 9:30 PM
Our Festival closes with VAFF 2005 alum Michael Kang’s second feature film, WEST 32ND. John Cho and Jun Kim star in this story about an ambitious lawyer who finds himself thrust into a sordid world of hard realities and moral compromises. Also featuring Vancouver talent, Grace Park, WEST 32ND takes us inside New York’s gritty Koreantown underworld. Preceding is the stylish PERMUTE, about an animated woman caught within a film noir setting and the journey within.
West 32nd
Director: Michael Kang | Producers: Teddy Zee, Miky Lee | Writers: Michael Kang, Edmund Lee
Narrative | DigiBeta | Colour | 2007 | 91 minutes | USA
When John (John Cho), an ambitious young lawyer, takes on a pro bono case to exonerate a fourteen year-old boy from a first-degree murder charge, he finds a world he never knew existed in the underbelly of Manhattan.
Infiltrating the knotty and complex realm of organized crime to search for clues, he meets his match, Mike (Jun Kim), a rising soldier in the syndicate. Recognizing John’s determination and daring, Mike brings John into his confidence, furtively drawing him into his own plans to rise within the underworld. Though they become fast friends, they just as quickly end up trying to use each other as they discover they’ll both do anything to win.
Previous Screenings: Tribeca Film Festival, Pusan Int’l Film Festival, DisOrient Asian American Film Festival, Newport Beach Int’l Film Festival, San Francisco Int’l Asian Film Festival
preceded by:
Permute
Director/Writer/Producer: Lydia Fu
Animation | Beta SP | B&W | 2008 | 5 minutes | Canada
Our existential heroine, Lulu, attempts to discover a cryptic fate that she is only able to discover through the oblique vignettes of a film noir cityscape.
