LAAPFF pays tribute to Bruce Lee with film screenings and panel discussions.
Look west, Los Angeles
By John Esther and Don Simpson
Showcasing 36 feature films and 134 shorts and videos the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival runs April 29-May 8 at various screening rooms from West Hollywood to downtown Los Angeles.
Featuring films from Asian and American-Asian artists, this year’s event features USC grad filmmaker Arvin Chen’s Au Revoir Taipei, Quentin Lee’s The People I’ve Slept With, Lixin Fan’s Last Train Home, Le Thanh Son’s Clash, a Bruce Lee 70th Birthday Celebration with screenings of Enter the Dragon and The Chinese Connection and panel discussions with directors and Lee’s family -- with Hong Kong’s current box office hit, Body and Assassins, directed by Teddy Chen.
For your consideration, here are a few films screening at this year’s LAAPFF.
Au Revoir Taipei -- With calm assurance and a refreshing restraint from mainstream histrionics and gangster violence, this year’s opening night film at LAAPFF tells the story of young man lost in love and organized crime. After his girlfriend leaves for France, Kai (Jack Yao) spends his time between working for his family’s restaurant and learning French at a local bookstore. Then one night he gets the “Dear Kai” call and is heartbroken. Muddled with love’s logic Kai decides he must go to France and save their relationship. But Kai does not have the money. However, a local man of many means, Brother Bao (check), can help the young lover out, but a little favor needs to be called in. Directed by Chen, Au Revoir Taipei, with its wet streets and pretty decor looks and feels like a kinder, gentler yet smarter version of the typical Hollywood or Hong Kong movie. Nobody really gets hurt but nobody really finds happiness either, but the finely acted film with its endearing characters leaves you believing they might if they keep it up. -- John Esther
(Au Revoir Taipei screens April 29, 7 p.m., DGA Theatre 1, May 2, 10 a.m., DGA Theatre 2)
Beijing Taxi -- Beijing Taxi commences two years prior to the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. The old city and communist lifestyle of Beijing has all but disappeared; a new city of skyscrapers, pillars of capitalism, is quickly rising from the rubble. As Bai Jiwen, a 54-year old Beijing taxi driver, studiously observes: “The pace of change has sped up, taking bigger strides. To welcome the Olympics! The whole country is supporting Beijing. Faster construction; faster environmental changes.” Bai is one of three primary subjects whom writer-director Miao Wang follows in order to chronicle the effects that the 2008 Olympic Games (and capitalism) have on working class Beijingers; the other two subjects – Zhou Yi and Wei Caixia – are also taxi drivers. The three characters are perfect examples of how education (or lack there of) can determine a person’s fate, especially in a capitalist economy. -- Don Simpson(Beijing Taxi screens May 2, 6:30 p.m., DGA Theatre 2)Lt. Watada -- This 40-minute documentary short film tells the story of the first commissioned United States military officer to refuse to deploy to Iraq. First Lieutenant Ehran Watada joined the U.S. Army in November 2003, after the Iraq war had already begun. According to Watada, he was motivated to join the Army in order to protect his country after the September 11th attacks, and he trusted the U.S. government’s decision to invade Iraq. After discovering that his unit would be deploying to Iraq, Watada began researching Iraq, its culture, and the reasons for the U.S. involvement in Iraq. Watada claims that after conducting his research and speaking with veterans returning from Iraq, he ceased to believe in the war’s legality and justification. In January 2006, he attempted to resign his commission rather than deploy to Iraq; he also began to speak out publicly against the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. Neither a pacifist nor a conscientious objector, Lt. Watada requested to be deployed to Afghanistan -- a war he considers legitimate -- but his commanders denied his requests. Lt. Watada is a David and Goliath story as Lt. Watada demonstrates his willingness to face court martial and eight years in prison rather than be a party to war crimes. -- Don Simpson(Lt. Watada screens with Sing China!, May 2, 2 p.m., DGA Theatre 1)Mamachas del Ring -- Wrestling or your family? That is the ultimatum posed to Carmen Rosa “The Champion” by her husband. Rosa, an indigenous Aymara (also referred to as a Cholita) woman living, working and wrestling in the Bolivian capital of La Paz, led a revolution of indigenous women who took their iconic polleras and bowler hats into the ring. Along with three other Cholitas (Julia La Paceńa, Martha La Alteńa, and Yolanda la Amorosa), Rosa rose to international stardom. Mamachas del Ring begins in 2006, as the Cholita wrestlers return from a high-profile appearance on Peruvian TV -- a publicity stunt that prompts jealousy and envy within the La Paz wrestling community. Rosa and friends are immediately barred from La Paz's primary wrestling league (managed by the evil Don Juan Mamani), a move that motivates Rosa and cohorts to attempt to organize their own wrestling events across Bolivia and Peru. Finally independent of male management, they are the first women wrestlers to manage their own business and contracts. Unfortunately, Rosa’s money making day job as a street vendor suffers from neglect as does her family. Director Betty M. Park’s Mamachas del Ring beautifully exemplifies Rosa’s unyielding struggle with gender and racial biases, while filling in necessary back-story with Christophe Lopez-Huici’s playful claymation. -- Don Simpson(Mamachas del Ring screens May 5, 7 p.m., Tateuchi Democracy Forum at NCDP)Raspberry Magic -- Uneven in terms of performance, direction, storyline, and ideas between nature/nurture and positivism/poetry, writer-director Leena Pendharkar's story about an 11-year-old girl named Monica Shah (Lily Javaherpour) coping with her parents (Meera Simhan and Ravi Kapoor) separation while working on a science project she hopes will win an upcoming contest while bringing her parents back together a la some some raspberry magic features enough finesse for a film festival family wanting to see a flick together. And do not come hungry because there is a lot of seeminly good food featured in Raspberry Magic. -- John Esther(Raspberry Magic screens May 1, 5 p.m., DGA Theatre 2)My Tehran For Sale -- Marzieh (Marzieh Vafamehr) is a young female actress and fashion designer living in Tehran, but she is forced to lead a secret life in order to express herself artistically. She meets Saman (Amir Chegini), an Iranian-born Australian citizen, at an underground rave. Saman offers to bring Marzieh to Australia with him and she accepts, but the question remains whether or not Australia will accept her. Much of the non-linear narrative is told in flashback; the pieces slowly falling into place linking the present to the past; the present being an Australian prison cell in which a haggard Marzieh is incarcerated (so we know that things don’t work out very well for her). Shot guerrilla-style entirely in Tehran, Iranian writer-director Granaz Moussavi’s (who immigrated to Australia with her parents in 1997) lush and hypnotic My Tehran For Sale focuses on the vibrant, urban, middle class of Tehran -- a side of Iran that the U.S. rarely sees. -- Don Simpson(My Tehran for Sale screens May 1, 8:30 p.m., Laemmle Sunset 5)For more information, go to http://asianfilmfestla.org/2010/ 
