Welcome to the 12th SDAFF Spring Showcase, an 8-day presentation of films from Asia and beyond.

A week-long presentation of Asian cinema.

The San Diego Asian Film Festival Spring Showcase is one of many year-round programs of the non-profit media arts organization Pacific Arts Movement (Pac Arts), including the popular San Diego Asian Film Festival, which takes place each fall.

We believe film has the power to enlighten, bridge communities, and change lives. If you love world cinema and rich, independent storytelling, JOIN THE MOVEMENT by becoming a member of Pac Arts.

Pac Arts’ hallmark exhibition, the San Diego Asian Film Festival (SDAFF), is San Diego’s premier film showcase of Asian American and international cinema.

Schedule
Thursday, April 20, 2023
7:00pm: Starring Jerry as Himself - 75 mins
“Better a poor life than a rich death.” So Jerry has always told himself – since moving to America, to working as an engineer for 40 years, to raising three boys. Always a saver, never a spender, he now sits on a nest egg in retirement, though you couldn’t tell from his old clothes and decrepit Orlando apartment. Still living that poor life.

One day, he gets a call from T-Mobile saying that his cell service is about to be cut off because he’s being investigated in China. It seems somebody’s been impersonating him in a money laundering scheme. At first, Jerry was just trying to save his phone plan. Now he’s fighting extradition to a place he hasn’t been to in years. With no other choice, he cooperates with the Shanghai police, whose officers send him on one mission after another to clear his name. Or so he thinks.

9:10pm: #Manhole - 99 mins
The night before his wedding, Kawamura goes out for some innocent drinks with co-workers. In the twist of all twists, on his walk home, he falls into an uncovered manhole. Stuck in a dark shaft with no working ladder and with the clock ticking down to his “I do’s,” Kawamura relies on some quick thinking and some desperate moves – including calling an ex for help. Needless to say, more twists lie ahead.

Friday, April 21, 2023
6:00pm: The Sunny Side of the Street - 111 mins
8:20pm: #Manhole - 99 mins
The night before his wedding, Kawamura goes out for some innocent drinks with co-workers. In the twist of all twists, on his walk home, he falls into an uncovered manhole. Stuck in a dark shaft with no working ladder and with the clock ticking down to his “I do’s,” Kawamura relies on some quick thinking and some desperate moves – including calling an ex for help. Needless to say, more twists lie ahead.

9:10pm: #Manhole - 99 mins
The night before his wedding, Kawamura goes out for some innocent drinks with co-workers. In the twist of all twists, on his walk home, he falls into an uncovered manhole. Stuck in a dark shaft with no working ladder and with the clock ticking down to his “I do’s,” Kawamura relies on some quick thinking and some desperate moves – including calling an ex for help. Needless to say, more twists lie ahead.

Saturday, April 22, 2023
12:30pm: Switch - 112 mins
Pop star Park Kang lives the golden life. Award shows, a manager to do his bidding, and scandals with starlets. One Christmas Eve though, a mysterious taxi driver delivers him to an alternate universe, and he awakens as an ordinary family man: kids crawling over him, no flashy condo, no limelight, and no starlets. Korean idols meet A Christmas Carol and The Prince and the Pauper in this lively tale of romance and redemption.

3:00pm: Finding Her Beat - 89 mins
If revolutions awaken to the beat of taiko drums, brace yourselves for the big one. Follow taiko drummers from two continents as they defy the male-dominated art form to put together an all-star women-centered concert led by the passionate and visionary Korean adoptee Jennifer Weir. Like surprising beauty emanating from a cracked geode, these artists channel long-quieted feelings into pounding, brilliant energy, and ordinary lives reverberate to heart-thumping beats as if marching off to war.

5:40pm: Polite Society - 103 mins
Ria wants to be a stuntwoman. Her badass artist sister helps Ria film kickass YouTube videos, while her high school BFFs are ready for battle should she need to rumble in real life. But high-flying life plans go haywire when the wrong man steps into the siblings’ dojo, and suddenly Ria finds herself in an unexpected adventure against the royals of Pakistani British high society. Heads will turn and sarees will fly, all while Ria proves that she’s no stunt double, she’s the star.

7:55pm: Leila’s Brothers - 169 mins
Her father and brothers may not admit it, but Leila runs their household. And when the family’s financial woes accumulate, Leila would be the one to come up with a plan, if only her harebrained brothers knew what was good for them. Saving a family that has long celebrated the men comes at a cost – and unearths hidden motivations. From the director of the acclaimed Just 6.5 (SDAFF 2019) comes an impassioned epic worthy of comparisons to Luchino Visconti.

Sunday, April 23, 2023
12:45pm: Rouge - 96 mins
Fleur and Twelfth Master have a love pact. When they die, they will reunite in the afterlife. But decades later, Fleur finds herself a lone ghost, wandering contemporary Hong Kong in a 1930s cheongsam, raising eyebrows with her saga of lost love. Out of fear and intrigue, a journalist and his girlfriend decide to help Fleur search for the missing Twelfth Master. A stunning tale of enduring passion and hope, ROUGE is a vision of Hong Kong becoming unrecognizable to itself, told as one of cinema’s greatest ghost stories.

2:50pm: Days of Being Wild - 95 mins
In 1960s Hong Kong, Yuddy (Leslie Cheung) and Lizhen (Maggie Cheung) count the seconds in a minute. Each tick, each breath entombed forever in the space between two strangers. These are the days of being mysterious, flirtatious, reprehensible, and irresistible. Reveling alongside them are Mimi (Carina Lau), Tide (Andy Lau), and an unnamed man in Hong Kong cinema’s most enigmatic cameo. When all fades to black, Anita Mui slinks in with the closing song. With DAYS OF BEING WILD, director Wong Kar-wai catapulted to legendary status and Leslie Cheung found his definitive role.

4:55pm: The Bride with White Hair - 89 mins
Leslie Cheung plays a merciless killer of the Wudang clan who, on the battlefield, chances upon a sphinxlike woman from his past. Entangled by lust, fate, and hair, the two defy the wuxia order. A truly incomparable high point of 1990s Hong Kong action, THE BRIDE WITH WHITE HAIR is a sensuous nightmare, enlivened by whip-fast nocturnal set pieces and electrified by two iconic performances in Leslie Cheung’s smoldering bravado and Brigitte Lin’s hot-blooded title assassin.

6:55pm: Who’s the Woman, Who’s the Man - 111 mins
There were some hiccups, but Wing, a young singer who’s convinced her fans that she’s a male idol, is finally together with Sam, the record producer who made Wing a star. But when Wing “accidentally” blurts to her audience that “he” is in love with her male producer, the duo become tabloid fodder. To add to the juice, an elusive androgynous former icon (played by Anita Mui) arrives in Hong Kong and becomes infatuated with both Wing and Sam. WHO’S THE WOMAN, WHO’S THE MAN is 1990s mainstream Hong Kong at its comic queerest.

9:15pm: Mystery Kung Fu Theater - 90 mins

Monday, April 24, 2023
5:25pm: Switch - 112 mins
Pop star Park Kang lives the golden life. Award shows, a manager to do his bidding, and scandals with starlets. One Christmas Eve though, a mysterious taxi driver delivers him to an alternate universe, and he awakens as an ordinary family man: kids crawling over him, no flashy condo, no limelight, and no starlets. Korean idols meet A Christmas Carol and The Prince and the Pauper in this lively tale of romance and redemption.

7:45pm: Nam June Paik: Moon is the Oldest TV - 109 mins
Rarely are avant-garde artists also pop icons. Even rarer are they Korean Americans. Nam June Paik was a visionary, a prankster, a scavenger, and a man of the world. Growing up in wartime Korea, Paik studied music in Japan and Germany, and then made a splash in New York City, where his fascination with the Sony Portapak led to experiments with electronic pictures that would later be termed video art. A documentary on the pioneering artist is long overdue, and Amanda Kim brings to life his beaming smile, his quixotic grandeur, and his creative wizardry, all with the humor that made Paik such an art world celebrity. Featuring abundant archival materials and Paik’s own writings, read by actor Steven Yeun.

Tuesday, April 25, 2023
6:00pm: While We Watched - 94 mins
A lightning-fast newsroom drama, a portrait of a truth-teller, a tale of a nation under siege by misinformation. WHILE WE WATCHED thrusts us straight into the day-to-day of Ravish Kumar, whose primetime news show is a respite from the polarized screaming matches on other networks, and whose commitment to evidence and research has made him a political target. Director Vinay Shukla depicts Kumar’s NDTV newsroom as a ticking timebomb, the fate of the Indian nation at stake, and an urgent allegory for so-called free democracies everywhere.

8:05pm: Joyland - 127 mins
In a patriarchal family beset by suppressed desires, adult son Haider finds an unexpected outlet. Haider’s scored a role as a background dancer in a local burlesque hall, a job too risqué for his father, brother, and wife, so he tells them he’s the new theater manager. Soon though he will harbor a second secret: that he has fallen smitten with the dance troupe’s leader: a glamorous transwoman who, unlike Haider, knows how to stand up for herself.

Wednesday, April 26, 2023
5:25pm: Joyland - 127 mins
In a patriarchal family beset by suppressed desires, adult son Haider finds an unexpected outlet. Haider’s scored a role as a background dancer in a local burlesque hall, a job too risqué for his father, brother, and wife, so he tells them he’s the new theater manager. Soon though he will harbor a second secret: that he has fallen smitten with the dance troupe’s leader: a glamorous transwoman who, unlike Haider, knows how to stand up for herself.

8:00pm: Ajoomma - 90 mins
If life turns down an unexpected path, is that detour or fate? Meet Lim Bee Hwa, a Singaporean everywoman ajoomma, whose plan to join a K-drama tour group takes surprising turns. On her travels, Lim encounters characters who could have sprung out of K-drama episodes themselves. As life imitates art, Lim discovers that the unexpected path can lead to exactly where she belongs, and her journey, even if ventured alone, can touch others along the way.

Thursday, April 27, 2023
5:40pm: Ajoomma - 90 mins
If life turns down an unexpected path, is that detour or fate? Meet Lim Bee Hwa, a Singaporean everywoman ajoomma, whose plan to join a K-drama tour group takes surprising turns. On her travels, Lim encounters characters who could have sprung out of K-drama episodes themselves. As life imitates art, Lim discovers that the unexpected path can lead to exactly where she belongs, and her journey, even if ventured alone, can touch others along the way.

7:45pm: Jamojaya - 90 mins
It was all a dream. Indonesian rapper James is in Hawai’i to record his first album. The record label puts him up in a cush pad, food delivered, producers at the ready, famed music video director primed to turn him into an international star. Gnawing at James’ soul a bit is the feeling that he’s losing his identity in the process. That James’ pesky elderly father from Indonesia tags along provides him a convenient scapegoat to let out his frustrations without alienating the label execs. But the weeks in paradise are about to come to a head: the awkwardness, the introspection, the family demons that follow him across the ocean.

In his most propulsive film to date, director Justin Chon (Blue Bayou, ****) delivers a different kind of immigrant tale – one of global stardom infused with mysticism and music. Chon evokes primordial bonds and unshakable specters, etched into the earnest but eerie face of veteran Yayu Unru as the father, and in the quiet distress of James, played by international hip-hop sensation Brian Imanuel (aka Rich Brian) in his first acting role.

Date: April 20 - 27, 2023

Location: UltraStar Cinemas Mission Valley - 7510 Hazard Center Drive San Diego, CA 92108

Tickets
All-Fest Pass
Non-Member - $110
PAC Arts Member - $75

General Admission
Non-Member - $12
PAC Arts Member - $9

Student / Senior / Military
Non-Member - $10

Groups Of 10+
Non-Member - $10

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