THE GRACE LEE PROJECT

World Premiere

USA 2005 | 68mins | Video Color

In person: Directors Grace Lee and Bryant Wang

Does your name dictate the kind of person you become? Filmmaker Grace Lee, often having been introduced to someone only to hear, "I know a Grace Lee," takes us on a brilliant, hilarious journey to uncover "Who is Grace Lee, anyway?" Smartly paced with humorous sidebars, Lee's eponymous project traces the chicken-and-egg name-is-fate dilemma from the perspectives of people who claim to have known the ubiquitous yet somehow elusive Grace Lee, and from multiple Grace Lees who reveal themselves to her.

While the filmmaker wonders why she's so unlike the smart, quiet, violin-playing girl everyone seems to know, viewers ponder their own individuality. Maybe 'Grace Lee' is the default category for Asian American females. The film reveals the intriguing contradiction that this person/a is simultaneously impressive and forgettable, special and generic, an emblem of a subculture and an individual who defies categorization. With wit and charm, THE GRACE LEE PROJECT challenges the personal and cultural investments made in Grace Lee, all the while sending a love letter to her.

Preceded by:

TOP WOMAN SHOOTER

USA 2004 | 22mins | Video Color
DIRECTOR: Bryant Wang
Vera Koo: wife, mother, top-ranked woman action shooter. What does your mom do after dinner? Austin Koo says his "cleans her guns and makes bullets."

—L.S. Kim