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Winnipeg Free Press

Spotlights shine on local productions at Asian-Canadian film festival

Faustina Dalmacio spends her workday behind the counter, but the Transcona pharmacist has always dreamed of getting behind the camera — to fill the frame instead of filling prescriptions. Two years ago, she bundled up in the January cold to shoot her debut short film, a comedic odyssey of two sisters (Riley Gregorio and Quinn Paredes) lost in Winnipeg's West End after the final bell rings in the halls of the fictional Victor Wolfe Elementary. To make After School, Dalmacio relied on a $10,000 Cinematoba grant from the National Screen Institute and the Winnipeg Foundation, an award accompanied by ongoing mentorship from producer Rebecca Gibson of Eagle Vision. SUPPLIED Director Ian Bawa (left) speaks with Mandeep Sodhi, star of The Best, during filming. 'It was inspired by an experience I had as a child,' says Dalmacio, 30, who moved to Manitoba from Bulacan, Philippines, in 2006. After a cousin's basketball game, she got separated from her sisters and temporarily stranded before one of the team parents drove her home. Her new home was harsh in climate, but welcoming and generous in spirit. That diasporic experience drives Dalmacio's short, one of 13 Manitoba-made pictures set to screen at this weekend's FascinAsian Film Festival, a multi-city event celebrating Asian-Canadian contributions to the film and media landscape. After screenings in Calgary and Edmonton earlier this month, the national festival wraps up in Winnipeg as Asian Heritage Month nears its end. Throughout filmmaker Ian Bawa's career, the festival has been a constant source of support for his projects, including his latest short, The Best, an 'accidental sequel' to his upcoming feature-length film Strong Son, itself an adaptation of an earlier short that's currently in post-production. SUPPLIED Filmmaker Faustina Dalmacio. Bawa will be interviewed by CBC's Faith Fundal during a Behind the Movies conversation and retrospective on Saturday (11:15 a.m.) at the WAG's Ilipvik Learning Steps. Bawa, whose films have screened at festivals such as the Toronto International Film Festival and Slamdance, says FascinAsian continues to help Asian filmmakers feel empowered to tell their own stories in their own voices. 'Sometimes I feel alone, telling stories about a turban-wearing guy, but then I watch 10 other films with characters like that,' says Bawa, whose short will screen Sunday alongside Dalmacio's in the Family Matters showcase at the WAG. (1 p.m.). 'People want these stories now, and it wasn't like this 15 years ago when I started. Now I know I'm not alone in this.' Also screening Sunday afternoon is a profile of local drag artist Ruby Chopstix. Becoming Ruby tells the story of the Vietnamese-Canadian queen, who in 2023 became the country's first drag artist-in-residence, working out of the Winnipeg non-profit Sunshine House. SUPPLIED After School is a comedic odyssey about two sisters. It's the latest short by documentarian Quan Luong, whose works includes Tailor-Made, about Ellice Avenue stitchmaster Tam Nguyen. 'For me as a filmmaker, I try to only make films that otherwise wouldn't be made, so stories like these really pull my attention. Luckily, Ruby and their family opened up to me,' says Luong, a 27-year-old Manitoba filmmaker who was born in Ho Chi Minh City. While the film will be having its local première this weekend — both in Sunday's program and at a special Saturday screening (11 a.m.) at the Park Theatre, with both Luong and Chopstix in attendance — Becoming Ruby recently screened at Toronto's Hot Docs International Film Festival and at both Edmonton and Calgary's FascinAsian showcases. Themes of travel, American dreaming and queer identity come to the fore in filmmaker Razid Season's Elijah, which was inspired by the director's volunteer work with the South Asian trans community through New York City non-profits. Weekly A weekly look at what's happening in Winnipeg's arts and entertainment scene. Set in the Big Apple, Elijah follows Bengali Muslim cab driver Haider (Ajaz Alam), who deals with the plummeting value of his taxi medallion as his daughter Shoshi (Mithila Gazi) embraces her trans identity. SUPPLIED Becoming Ruby focuses on Vietnamese-Canadian drag artist Ruby Chopstix. 'Stories like these are often invisible. It's fiction, but it's inspired by real people,' says Season, 38, a Bengali director who was raised in the United Arab Emirates before studying film at City College in New York. Other festival offerings include Fateema Al-Hamaydeh Miller's Mawtini, about Nawal, a young Palestinian woman, and Tanya, an Indigenous senior, who battle their building managers to plant a garden on their apartment block's lawn (Saturday, 1:45 p.m.). On Saturday at 4 p.m., after the screening of Paper Flowers at WAG-Qaumajuq, stars Olivia Liang (Kung Fu, Legacies) and Kapil Talwalkar (Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist) will join audiences for a virtual Q&A moderated by radio programmer Iris Yudai. SUPPLIED Filmmaker Razid Season. SUPPLIED Elijah is set in New York City. SUPPLIED Mandeep Sodhi in Ian Bawa's film The Best. Ben WaldmanReporter Ben Waldman is a National Newspaper Award-nominated reporter on the Arts & Life desk at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Ben completed three internships with the Free Press while earning his degree at Ryerson University's (now Toronto Metropolitan University's) School of Journalism before joining the newsroom full-time in 2019. 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