By Fan Huang
Opening today was Chuck Mitsui’s ONE KINE DAY, a coming-of-age story about Ralsto, a hapa teenage skater. Riding casually through the lush Hawaii landscapes, Ralsto encounters things over the period of one day that will forever change his life. Mitsui examines the unglamorous and also unsettling aspect of Hawaii life—the overly laid back atmosphere that can lead to callousness and danger. It also raises the question of the lack of development of men in today’s society.
Flash forward to Lu Zhang’s DOOMAN RIVER, a film beautifully shot about the tragic circumstances surrounding a young boy Chang-ho, his mute sister, and their grandfather when they meet North Korean refugees. Very much influenced and reminiscent of Italian neorealism, the film gives us a fly-on-the-wall perspective with many long takes of long and medium shots. The film also features a minimalistic style with no flashy editing sequences, allowing the audience to properly view and understand the plight of these unfortunate individuals.
Nearly ending the day was a panel, THE NEW MATRIX moderated by Anderson Le discussing Vietnamese cinema with Stephane Gauger, Ngo Thanh Van, and Johnny Tri Nguyen. Vietnamese cinema, still in its nascent stage, has exploded over the last several years and part of that is due to independent production companies. Although it focuses on the Vietnamese film industry, it provides a background on the exciting future of independent films through a more global collaboration.
We managed to visit the tropical beaches of Hawaii, the desolate ice wastelands of China, and also discuss the future of Vietnamese cinema with Vietnam’s own “Bradalinga”—Ngo Tranh and Johnny Tri Nguyen—which shows the incredible diversity of Asian and Asian-American films in the 29th annual San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival.
Fan is a participant in this year’s Verizon Student Delegate Program
Still waters ran deep in Lu Zhang’s beautifully stark depiction of rural China. Seemingly innocuous events coalesce to create a harsh representation of how racial tensions form and become indoctrinated in a society. DOOMAN RIVER used sparseness and simplicity to construct a compelling, gut-wrenching narrative. It paired perfectly with ONE KINE DAY to showcase how cinematic subtleties can powerfully convey the inexplicable.
Great insight into the film – Dooman River, The film is talking about the marginal people living in the border land of China and North Korea. The director has very well engaged the audience into the narrative of the film by not showing everything. The impact of this style of narrative story telling is more. It disturbs more and stays longer.
I also attended the New Matrix panel. The panel inspired Asian-American artists to consider going back to their homeland to make and distribute films overseas. Although the entertainment industry in countries like Vietnam, Philippines, or Malaysia are not that established, the markets are rapidly growing for innovative passionate artists to possibly carve their own niche. We’re definitely living in an exciting time for Asian and Asian-American media.
My favorite director tidbit from Mitsui: protagonist Ralsto’s t-shirt gets turned inside-out at his great moment of inciting character development. Chuck Mitsui noted that he carefully selected native Hawaiian actors to assure authenticity. I also think it is interesting to note that the pace of life characteristic to Hawaii is reflected in the pace of film, and indeed Chuck Mitsui shot on location in Hawaii. Per our discussion with Aseem Chabra, authenticity is key. One Kine Day was everything Hawaiian, and I felt privileged to visit.