Slant combats tired stereotypes of Asian Americans with quirky comedies, compelling visions, and fresh perspectives on the Asian American experience. This program runs for 109 minutes with a brief intermission halfway through.
The majority of the 11 films in this year's program are being screened in Texas for the first time. Some of the films may share themes, but their subject matter couldn't be more different.
Waiting for a Train, by Oscar Bucher, is a documentary about Toshio Hirano, a musician whose lifelong love of bluegrass takes him on a journey from Tokyo to Texas to California. Machine With Wishbone, by Canadian filmmaker Randall Okita, uses the artwork of Arthur Ganson to tell the story of a little wishbone on a whimsical journey through a world of snoring beds and paper birds. Aram Siu Wai Collier's The Others uses found footage to humorously build up a love-hate drama between numerous 'ethnic' characters - Mexican, Navajo, Inuit, Lakota, Puerto Rican and Arab - all played by one man, Lou Diamond Phillips.
This year's festival also features works by a few Texas-born or based filmmakers. Josh Kim, a native of Orange, Texas, tells a tale of love letters and missed connections in The Postcard. Soham Mehta and Tim Tsai, both in the MFA film program at University of Texas Austin, are back at Slant for the second year in a row with very different films. Tsai's comedy, Alley of Hidden Dangers!, pits two robbery-minded thugs against a tough Asian mom, while Mehta's drama Survivors, presents the bone-chilling predicament of the only two people left alive in their town after a zombie attack.
The full list of films includes:
Girl with a Walkman by Melina Leon
Five Fingers by Kevin Barker
Beijing Haze by J.P. Chan
The Postcard by Josh Kim
One Night in LA by Jon Maxwell & Ray Huang
Survivors by Soham Mehta
Alley of Hidden Dangers! by Tim Tsai
Waiting for a Train: The Toshio Hirano Story by Oscar Bucher
The Pain with Being Thirsty by David Yun
Machine with Wishbone by Randall Okita
The Others by Aram Siu Wai Collier
ABOUT MELISSA HUNG
Melissa Hung is the founder of Slant, a writer and journalist, and the founding editor of Hyphen, a magazine about Asian American culture. A native Texan, she now lives and eats her way through San Francisco.