For all you cinephiles, it’s film festival season! From Indian films and retrospectives, to Visual Communications’ annual Asian film mega-fest, here are some happening this month you’re not going to want to miss (hint: Justin Lin, Dwayne Johnson and Sung Kang are back!).
9th Annual Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles
The 9th Annual Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA), which takes place April 12-17 at ArcLight Hollywood in Los Angeles, will be featuring 13 feature films, 6 documentaries and 13 short films starring the hottest talent from the Subcontinent you can’t miss. Find out more here.
A scene from Satyajit Ray's 1973 film "Distant Thunder."
Long Shadows: The Late Work of Satyajit Ray
The Film Society of Lincoln Center, New York, will celebrate India’s greatest filmmaker and one of cinema’s greatest auteurs, Satyajit Ray, in this week-long tribute (April 19-26), including a screening of The Home and the World, his final, wonderful adaptation of a work by his mentor, Rabindranath Tagore. Get tickets and info here.
Tribeca Film Festival
The 10th edition of the venerable Tribeca Film Festival is on from April 20-May 1. And in addition to the biggies (Cameron Crowe’s The Union, Last Night starring Keira Knightley), there are plenty of Asian films to enjoy. Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame, directed by Tsui Hark, is set in a fantastical steampunk version of ancient China and stars Chinese superstars Andy Lau, Li Bingbing (star of the upcoming Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, and our next cover girl!), Carina Lau, and Tony Leung Ka-fai. Jiro Dreams of Sushi follows the master sushi chef behind the three Michelin star restaurant Sukiyabashi Jiro. Other must-sees include The Journals of Musan, about a North Korean defector forging a life in capitalist South Korea; Let the Bullets Fly, the highest grossing Chinese film ever starring Chow Yun-Fat; and Underwater Love: A Pink Musical, a Japanese softcore “pink” film. Find out more here.
Deng Chao and Li Bingbing in Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame.
Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival
Don’t miss Southern California’s largest Asian film showcase, this year running from April 28 to May 7, and featuring 180 films from more than 20 countries. It’s going to be a good one this year, with Justin Lin’s newest action-thriller Fast Five, starring Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Jordana Brewster, Sung Kang and Dwayne Johnson, opening the 10-day fest. Get more info and tickets here.
Justin Lin's "Fast Five" opens the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival.
Related Articles
For all you lovers of celluloid, the film fest love continues. The Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival kicks off tomorrow, April 29, and goes till May 8. Some films we’ll definitely be watching: The Actresses, May 8 Six big-time, multi-generational South Korean actresses come together on Christmas Eve for a once-in-a-lifetime Vogue magazine cover [...]
April is here, which means it’s that time again … HIFF is back. HIFF, short for Hawaii International Film Festival, showcases films from around the world twice a year here in the islands. April marks the 2011 Spring Showcase, hosted at the Regal Dole Cannery Stadium. The film festival runs for a week (April [...]
The 11th Annual San Diego Asian Film Festival is hitting Southern California next weekend (October 21-28) with an impressive lineup of Asian and Asian American films aiming to connect audiences to the human experience though the Pan Asian media arts. The weeklong festival is jam-packed with everything including captivating panels from Youtube pioneers and Asian American [...]
Not all of Indian cinema is associated with Bollywood. And the Indo-American Arts Council’s 11th annual New York Indian Film Festival, going on from May 4 to 8, is the place to get a real feel for the independent and social aspects of Indian film in New York. It may not be all singing and [...]
Audrey contributor Mira Advani Honeycutt gets us a backstage pass into the parties at the Toronto Film Festival. Here, her report. Toronto, Canada: The film festival is in full swing with over 300 films, international stars and parties. And the red carpet is sizzling with such stellar names as Angelina Jolie, Keira Knightly, Freida Pinto, [...]
