Reel Asian
Mini and Poni are twins (in the grand tradtion of The Parent Trap, both are played by Huang Peijia) and as one might imagine, they’re inseparable. Their lives are wholly intertwined, not just because of the biological bond that they share, but also because they spend every waking moment with one another. They play on the same team, get the same grades and rely on each other for everything…until they start questioning their bond and how it affects their individual identities. Is it healthy for them to be so similar and never question it? When two very different boys take...
Screening at the 2012 Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival, The Woodsman and the Rain is a very sweet and funny film focusing on the unlikely friendship of Katsu (Koji Yakusho) and Koichi (Shun Oguri). A lumberjack and widower, Katsu lives in a small mountain village. His work is interrupted one day by a production assistant from a zombie movie that is filming in the woods. Initially annoyed by the crew, Katsu soon finds himself helping them with location scouting. After playing a zombie in one scene, Katsu begins to enjoy the process, and becomes friends with the young director,...
In Ho Yim‘s Floating City, we follow a young man on his lifelong journey from Chinese fishing boat to pedigreed employee of the East India Company. Bo Wa Chuen is abandoned as a baby, a mysteriously blue-eyed Asian tot (his mixed-race heritage is unknown), and taken in by a poor family who lives on a fishing boat. While his six siblings are eventually left off at orphanages themselves, since the fishing boat mother cannot feed them after their father leaves, Bo pursues a life of climbing the ladder. He works his way up from lowly labourer to esteemed engineer for...
Screening at the 2012 Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival, The Fruit Hunters is the latest documentary from Yung Chang. Mainly focusing on average people and their intense love for exotic fruit, the documentary also explores the problems with monoculture farming, and the sense of community found by people who share their love of fruit with each other. To call this just a documentary seems wrong. This is the fruit equivalent of Jiro Dreams of Sushi. The people featured in the film, including Bill Pullman, don’t enjoy fruit. They have a passionate love affair with it. The fruit is beautifully...
The “Hard Look” Shorts Programme is a small collection of shorts that reveal disappointment, unfulfilled lives, sacrifice, sadness, marginalization, and miscommunication. The lived experiences exposed in these pieces can be difficult to watch, not because of any violence or gore, but rather because of the uncomfortable feeling of unmet expectations and dreams forgotten. The films provide a snapshot of stark realities we would sometimes rather ignore. A+ Directed by Nobu Adilman this is a beautifully choreographed organization of movie stats and grading schemes. Accompanied by the piano music of Dan Werb’s Mute, this...
From director Lee Yong Ju comes a story of first love and reunion. Former college colleagues Lee Seung Min (Uhm Tae Woong) and Yang Seo Yeon (Ha Ga In) meet after several years when Seo Yeon commissions Seung Min to build her dream home. Reflecting on their past, we’re taken back to college years where young Seung Min (Lee Je Hoon) shyly falls in love with Seo Yeon (Bae Suzy). As the present day house project gets more complex, so, we learn, does their relationship. The romantic inside me wonders, does first love get a second chance? Making its Canadian...
On the afternoon of Friday, November 9, 2012, a small group of very eager people gathered at Nobody Writes to the Colonel at the corner of Bathurst and College. We were all there for one reason: legendary editor, director, writer and actor David Wu was holding a master class. The master class is part of the Reel Asian Industry Series, now in its 7th year. The goal of a master class is for someone who is at the top of their game to impart specific knowledge about techniques and skills in their area of expertise. And that is exactly what...
Roti, the crispy, flatbread-wrapped curried meat dish is called something slightly different depending on where you are in the world. The North American version we all know and love hails from Trinidad is actually called dal puri, a sort of rootless hybrid of many different regions of the world. In pursuit of the origin of his late mother’s version of the dish, director Richard Fung sets out on a journey to uncover its history by visiting everywhere from his native Trinidad to India and beyond. As his investigation deepens, he begins to learn the grim history that helped to shape...
Screening at the 2012 Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival, 10+10 is a huge anthology of short films. 20 short films, five minutes each, directed by ten renowned directors and ten up and coming directors. From silent film, black and white, colour, genre material, documentary, drama, and comedy, every aspect is covered. As with any anthology film, some of the shorts are going to stand out from the others. This certainly holds true for 10+10, but the limited running time for each segment tends to take away from the really great ones. As soon as they begin to get interesting,...
Wolf Children is director Mamoru Hosoda‘s latest film, and tells the story of Hana (Aoi Miyazaki) who meets a mysterious man (Takao Osawa) and falls in love, unaware that he’s a descendant of the Japanese wolf. Together, they have two children, a daughter named Yuki (Haru Kuroki) and a son named Ame (Yukito Nishii). The children have the ability to turn into wolves, but when their father is found dead, Hana is left to raise the children on her own. In order to keep her children’s gift a secret, Hana moves the family into the mountains where she must help...
Set in 1938 China, Cold Steel follows Lianfeng (Peter Ho), a young hunter living a peaceful life in a small town. Out hunting one day, a plane crashes nearby, so Lianfeng investigates. He finds an American soldier trapped, and saves his life just before the plane explodes. Taking the soldier into town, Lianfeng meets Liu Yan (Song Jia), a woman who runs a teahouse and a makeshift hospital. Naturally, Lianfeng falls for Liu Yan, but her teahouse also causes problems for Lianfeng as he gets into a fight with some soldiers. Arrested for the dispute, Lianfeng saves the day once...
Screening as part of the 2012 Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival, Seeking Asian Female is a documentary by Debbie Lum that follows Steven, a 60-year-old man looking for an Asian bride. The original idea of exploring cultural stereotypes and Steven’s interest in Asian women quickly changes when Steven meets Sandy. Flying from China to California, Steven and Sandy have 90 days to either get married or have Sandy return to China. Debbie quickly becomes a part of their relationship, bridging the gap between two cultures using the Mandarin she learned in college to play translator and matchmaker. Seeking Asian...
