PRESS ROOM

23rd SAN FRANCISCO 
INTERNATIONAL ASIAN AMERICAN FILM FESTIVAL 
MARCH 10-20, 2005 IN SAN FRANCISCO, BERKELEY, AND SAN JOSE

Fest Vets return to pick past film faves in celebration of NAATA's silver anniversary

Since its founding in 1980, the National Asian American Telecommunication Association (NAATA) has been the nation’s leading Asian American media arts organization. Over the course of its 25 years, NAATA has awarded over $3 million in grants to filmmakers, and supported more than 1000 Asian American projects through educational distribution, public television broadcast and festival exhibition. To celebrate its landmark 25th anniversary, NAATA has asked three Guest Programmers—Renee Tajima-Pe–a, Justin Lin and the team of Gurinder Chadha and Paul Mayeda Berges—to select films from its past which embody the spirit, history and diversity of its work.

Renee Tajima-Pe–a's choices a trio of short docs 

Robert Nakamura's MANZANAR (1971), Curtis Choy's DUPONT GUY - THE SCHIZ OF GRANT AVENUE (1976) and Arthur Dong's SEWING WOMAN (1982) are Renee Tajima-Pe–a's choices. These three pioneering Asian American documentaries continue to impact audiences and filmmakers. MANZANAR was the first documentary to address the Japanese American internment; DUPONT GUY is a radical statement on the internal identity conflicts of Chinatown, and SEWING WOMAN is a portrait of the filmmaker's immigrant mother and her remarkable resilience. The trio will be screening March 12 at the AMC Kabuki 8 Theatres in San Francisco. MANZANAR, DUPONT GUY and SEWING WOMAN are distributed by NAATA. 

Renee Tajima-Pe–a is an award-winning documentary filmmaker, scholar and film critic. Her films include: MY AMERICA... (OR HONK IF YOU LOVE BUDDHA) and the Academy Award-nominated WHO KILLED VINCENT CHIN? She is currently an associate professor of Community Studies at UC Santa Cruz.

Justin Lin picks A.K.A. DON BONUS and PASSING THROUGH

Justin Lin picks two: Spencer Nakasako's A.K.A. DON BONUS and Nathan Adolfson's PASSING THROUGH. After escaping the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, the Ny family struggles with resettlement in the U.S. Their lives unfold through the lens of this stirring video diary, A.K.A. DON BONUS. As 18-year-old Sokly Ny (Don Bonus) struggles to graduate from high school, his family is harassed in the housing projects, his eldest brother cannot fill a dead father's shoes and his youngest brother ends up in a youth prison. In the 1998 short PASSING THROUGH, recent college grad, Nathan Adolfson—a Korean adoptee from Minnesota—returns to his birth land. The film offers an absorbing account of how cultural barriers can sometimes stimulate rather than hinder personal growth. About A.K.A DON BONUS, Lin remembers "watching it and being moved and excited to see not only a unique perspective and experience but also a style and aesthetic I had never seen before. You must remember that this was made before the reality TV craze. Four years later, when I was editing Nathan Adolfson’s documentary PASSING THROUGH, BONUS's sensibility, sincerity and trust were an enormous influence." Emmy Award-winning A.K.A. DON BONUS was co-produced and funded by NAATA and made its world premiere at SFIAAFF 1995. NAATA has presented the film on public television and is its educational distributor. PASSING THROUGH was funded and presented on public television by NAATA. The films screen March 12 at the AMC Kabuki 8 Theatres in San Francisco. 

Justin Lin is a Los Angeles-based filmmaker whose works include the hit BETTER LUCK TOMORROW and the influential SHOPPING FOR FANGS. His short documentary SPOTLIGHTING will make its world premiere at this year's Festival.

Gurinder Chadha and Paul Mayeda Berges present one from the heart

Gurinder Chadha and Paul Mayeda Berges' selection is Deann Borshay Liem's FIRST PERSON PLURAL. Borshay Liem's debut film is a personal documentary exploring the complicated landscape of assimilation, adoption, cultural difference, American attitudes and mistaken identity. Drawing upon original and archival material, FIRST PERSON PLURAL traverses a difficult and intimate terrain. Borshay Liem's struggle to confront the secrets of her childhood and reconcile the demands of two families, two cultures and two nations reveals a poignant story about loss and finding a new way home. As Chadha and Berges enthuse, "It is fearless and has to be admired for its emotional honesty and power." FIRST PERSON PLURAL, screening March 11 at the AMC Kabuki 8 Theatres in San Francisco, was funded by NAATA and was the Opening Night film of SFIAAFF 2000. NAATA has also presented the film on public television and is its educational distributor.

Gurinder Chadha and Paul Mayeda Berges are the writer/director creative team behind the celebrated films BEND IT LIKE BECKHAM and BRIDE AND PREJUDICE. Berges was the director of the Festival in 1994 and Chadha is one of England's leading filmmakers.

The SFIAAFF gratefully acknowledges its sponsors

The 23rd San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, presented by NAATA and Asia Street on International Channel is supported in part by the Asian Art Museum, Canadian Consulate Trade Office, Comcast, Grants for the Arts, Koret Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, Noon, Oscar Printing, Procter & Gamble, Radisson Miyako Hotel, San Francisco Tobacco Free Project, Wallace Alexander Gerbode Foundation, and Wells Fargo. NAATA is supported with major funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

The San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, runs March 10-17, 2005 at the AMC Kabuki 8 Theatres, 1881 Post Street, and the Castro Theatre, 429 Castro Street in San Francisco; and the Pacific Film Archive, 2575 Bancroft Way in Berkeley and March 18-20 at the Camera 12 Cinemas, 201 South Second Street in San Jose. For more information, please telephone (415) 865-1588 or visit www.naatanet.org/festival on the Internet.