The 20th anniversary NYAFF boasts a handful of this year’s most innovative and important films about the LGBTQ+ experience from all around Asia. NYAFF is proud to say that three of them have been selected for their Uncaged Competition for Best Film.
Angry Son by Kasho Iizuka, Japan, Uncaged Competition
7/28/2022 9:30pm
An intensely moving, gently comedic coming-of-age tale about overcoming otherness and oppression through unconditional compassion, this charming film by a transgender director focuses on a gay, biracial teen who was raised by a Filipina bar hostess mother in the countryside of Japan, and has endured a full spectrum of prejudices.
Big Night! by Jun Robles Lana, Philippines
7/27/2022 6:15pm
A biting satire about a gay hairdresser (a superlative Christian Bables) and model citizen who learns that he has been added to a government kill list, and sets out on a harrowing — and sometimes hilarious — odyssey to clear his name and stay alive.
Happy Together by Wong Kar Wai, Hong Kong, 1997
7/16/2022 9:00pm
NYAFF features a free, outdoor screening of this queer relationship classic, with superstars Tony
Leung Chiu Wai and Leslie Cheung Kwok Wing as a couple who break and make up as they travel through Argentina
I Am More by Lee Il-ha, South Korea
7/24/2022 7:00pm
A compassionate, colorful documentary about Korean transgender trailblazer and fabulous drag queen More, whose years of rigorous training as a ballerina culminate in an invitation to dance in New York.
Perhaps Love by Cho Eun-ji, South Korea, Uncaged Competition
7/26/2022 9:00pm
An ebullient screwball comedy wrapped around a poignant tale of discovering and rediscovering love in all its permutations, this joyous film follows a washed-up novelist (Best from the East Award-winner Ryu Seung-ryong) who is reinvigorated by a collaboration with his gifted gay student.
Tank Fairy by Erich Rettstadt, Taiwan/USA
7/28/2022 3:30pm
In this enchanting short film, a sassy gas-tank delivery woman turns out to be a queer young
boy’s fairy godmother, and makes his most fabulous, outré dreams come true. Director Erich
Rettstadt will also join the LGBTQ+ panel.
Terrorizers by Ho Wi Ding, Taiwan
7/24/2022 4:00pm
Although the LGBTQ+ experience is not the focus of this ensemble drama, two of the film’s troubled 20-something characters fall in love and explore a same-sex relationship. It’s just one of the connections that is severed by the
slash of a flashing blade when a delusional young man (Austin Lin of iWeirDO, NYAFF 2020) mounts a public attack with a ninja sword.
#LookAtMe by Ken by Kwek, Singapore, Uncaged Competition
7/23/2022 4:00pm
An exhilarating, damning and morally essential fable about social media celebrity, cancel culture and the erosion of human rights that veers from the deadly serious to the colorfully camp.
NYAFF Talk Panel: Celebrating Asian LGBTQ+ Cinema with Directors Ken Kwek, Erich Rettstadt, Leon Lê
A discussion celebrating the impact LGBTQ+ cinema has had and continues to have worldwide, addressing the representation of Asian queer identities in film and the challenges filmmakers face to produce LGBTQ+ content.
