PASSAGE (India, dir. Askari Kumar)-AAAFF-2020.
The Austin Asian American Film Festival (AAAFF) kicked off the lineup for its Online Shorts Festival yesterday, with programming continuing through June 17, 2020. AAAFF’s Shorts Festival is in lieu of the 12th annual staging of the event, which was slated for July, but canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Organizers report that in-person screenings and a slate of feature films is postponed until late fall, pandemic permitting.
“The opportunity to create an online shorts festival made it possible for us to highlight more films and filmmakers than we would usually be able to,” says AAAFF Executive Director Hanna Huang. “Just as the world has had to adapt to the current circumstances, we had to do so to continue our work in supporting AAPI stories on screen. The xenophobia and anti-Asian racism that has been stoked along with the pandemic only highlights the urgency of our mission.”
GAY AS IN HAPPY- A QUEER ANTI-TRAGEDY (Canada, dir. Jordana Valerie Allen-Shim)-AAAFF-2020
In addition, today AAAFF will host “Have You Eaten Yet?,” an AAAFF game show, from 7:30 – 9:00 PM, followed by, on June 13, “Homeschool with G-Su (presented by Y’all We Asian and ColdTowne Theater), and on June 17 from 7:30-9 PM, a closing party presented by GivePulse.
Among the films slated for Online Shorts are the following, via AAAFF:
PASSAGE (India, dir. Askari Kumar) — Finding herself in a state of limbo, an Indian woman revisits her immigration journey and voyages through a tempestuous emotional landscape of memory, identity, belonging and the illusion of the American Dream.
WHEN SUMMER COMES (U.S., dir. Jiwon Uhm) — In the days leading up to their separation, two teenage girls face the biggest fight of their friendship when one finds a cigarette on an impromptu trip to their old elementary school.
GAY AS IN HAPPY: A QUEER ANTI-TRAGEDY (Canada, dir. Jordana Valerie Allen-Shim) — An experimental autoethnographical documentary about queer joy, resistance, and resilience in the face of abuse, trauma, and transphobia.
WHEN SUMMER COMES (U.S., dir. Jiwon Uhm)-AAAFF-2020.
For the full lineup of films and more information on the festival, please visit AAAFF’s website here.
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AAAFF Online Shorts Festival admittance is available via purchase of the full series ($11.99; virtual access to all shorts for the duration of the online festival) or tickets to individual, soon-to-be-announced “blocks” (virtual access to the shorts in the themed “block” for the duration of the online festival). Series passes are on sale now at https://vimeo.com/ondemand/
The mission of the Austin Asian American Film Festival (AAAFF) is to tell Asian and Asian American stories via media arts and help Asian Americans explore opportunities in cinema.
