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Forbes
29-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
AAIFF 2025 Brings 90+ Asian And Asian American Films To NYC
The 48th Asian American International Film Festival will run from July 31 - August 10, 2025. The Asian American International Film Festival (AAIFF) returns to New York City this week for its 48th year, bringing 11 days of fresh and compelling storytelling from across the Asian diaspora. Starting July 31st, the festival will showcase more than 90 films, including documentaries, narrative features, shorts and music videos. Besides film screenings, it will also hold filmmaker Q&As, panel discussions, special receptions and an awards ceremony. Here's what you need to know about the 48th Asian American International Film Festival (AAIFF48). What is the Asian American International Film Festival (AAIFF)? The Asian American International Film Festival (AAIFF) is the oldest and longest running U.S. film festival dedicated to highlighting Asian and Asian American stories. AAIFF47 Opening Night Screening Who organizes AAIFF? The annual festival is organized by Asian CineVision, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit committed to 'the development, exhibition, promotion, and preservation of Asian and Asian American experiences through storytelling.' Since its launch in 1978 in New York City's Lower East Side, AAIFF has screened movies by emerging and established filmmakers from more than 20 countries. Past editions have featured U.S. premieres by iconic directors like Wayne Wang (The Joy Luck Club, Maid in Manhattan) and Ang Lee (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; Brokeback Mountain). A packed audience at the 47th Asian American International Film Festival When is the 2025 Asian American International Film Festival (aka AAIFF48)? AAIFF48 runs from from Thursday, July 31st through Sunday, August 10th, 2025. Where is AAIFF48 taking place? In-person screenings and other events at AAIFF48 will take place across five different venues in Manhattan. The hybrid festival will feature both in-person and online film screenings, with most of the in-person screenings happening at Regal Union Square. For more information, visit the AAIFF website. Featured films at AAIFF48: Slanted, Transplant and more With over 90 films being screened at this year's AAIFF, it would be impossible to list them all here, but here are a few highlights: The festival will kick off on Thursday, July 31st with a red carpet and screening of Slanted, which won the narrative feature competition at SXSW. Written and directed by Chinese-Australian filmmaker Amy Wang in her feature debut, the satirical thriller follows a Chinese-American teen who undergoes experimental surgery to look white in an effort to be named prom queen—a decision that leads to drastic and unforeseen consequences. Slanted stars Shirley Chen (Didi, Beast Beast), Mckenna Grace (Ghostbusters: Afterlife, Gifted) and Maitreyi Ramakrishnan (Never Have I Ever, Freakier Friday). A Q&A and reception will follow the screening. Shirley Chen stars as insecure Chinese-American teen Joan Huang in 'Slanted.' Tamil filmmaker Chithra Jeyaram's Love Chaos Kin upends the traditional narrative around transracial adoptions. The documentary tells the story of half-white, half-Native American twins who are adopted into a South Asian immigrant family. Complex questions about race, identity and belonging arise when the twins reconnect with their white birth mother and their estranged Navajo father. Decathlon: The CK Yang & Rafer Johnson Story, a documentary by Taiwanese-Canadian director Frank W. Chen, chronicles the real-life friendship and rivalry between C.K. Yang—the first Taiwanese athlete to win an Olympic medal—and American decathlete and Olympic gold medalist Rafer Johnson amidst the turbulent backdrop of the Cold War and the civil rights movement. AAIFF48's Centerpiece Screening is Transplant, a gripping thriller about an ambitious and gifted surgical resident who gets more than he bargained for when he comes under the tutelage of a preeminent heart transplant surgeon. Co-produced by Forest Whitaker and starring Korean-American K-pop star and multi-hyphenate entertainer Eric Nam, Transplant is the feature directorial debut of Korean-American filmmaker Jason Park, who also co-wrote and co-produced the film. A Q&A and reception will take place after the screening. Eric Nam stars as Jonah Yoon in 'Transplant.' The documentary Mistress Dispeller gives an intimate look into a bizarre profession that's burgeoning in China: the mistress dispeller. When a Chinese woman learns that her husband has been cheating on her with a younger woman, she enlists the help of Wang Zhenxi, a 'mistress dispeller' whose job it is to save their marriage and end the extramarital affair. Directed by Hong Kong filmmaker Elizabeth Lo, who also co-wrote and co-produced the film, Mistress Dispeller had its world premiere at last year's Venice International Film Festival and boasts a 100% critics' score on Rotten Tomatoes as of this writing. In Shook Saamer Usmani (3 Body Problem, Succession) plays Ashish, an aspiring writer who struggles to navigate his parents' divorce, a stalled writing career and his father's Parkinson's diagnosis. But a budding romance with the charming barista Claire leads him to discover that life can still offer joy and fulfillment, even if it doesn't always go as planned. Directed, co-written and co-produced by Indo-Canadian documentary filmmaker Amar Wala, Shook marks Wala's scripted feature debut and is partly based on his own personal experiences. AAIFF48 will also feature a variety of short films grouped into 10 shorts showcases. Additionally, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Asian CineVision, AAIFF48 will host a series of panels and special events, including a showing of Filipino-American filmmaker H.P. Mendoza's 2009 musical comedy Fruit Fly and a screening of the never-before-released director's cut of Captain America, the 1990 superhero film by the late auteur and cult favorite Albert Pyun. For the full schedule of film screenings and other events, visit How to watch AAIFF48 films Some films will be screened in-person only, while others will only be available to watch online as video-on-demand (VOD). There are also films that offer both in-person and online viewing options. How to buy tickets for AAIFF48 General tickets are $18 for in-person screenings and $10 for VOD and can be purchased directly on the festival website. Discounted ticket packages are also available. To purchase tickets for in-person and/or online screenings, visit and navigate to the Tickets tab. You can also buy tickets directly on each film's info page on the AAIFF website. For more information on ticketing options, check out the FAQ section of the AAIFF website.
South China Morning Post
11-07-2025
- Entertainment
- South China Morning Post
How Wayne Wang's Chinese Box presented the 1997 Hong Kong handover from a unique viewpoint
Inspired by Paul Theroux's 1997 novel Kowloon Tong, Chinese Box stars Jeremy Irons as John, an English writer who has lived in Hong Kong for 15 years and is dying of leukaemia. Wang was born in Hong Kong but is best known for his work in the United States, his adopted home. Being 'one side Chinese and one side American', as he considers himself, put him in a unique position. Perhaps the closest is Chinese Box (1997), an American indie film directed by Wayne Wang The Joy Luck Club ). While there are plenty of Hong Kong films about the city's 1997 handover to China after British rule , there are precious few told from a Western perspective. This is the latest instalment in a feature series reflecting on instances of East meets West in world cinema, including China-US co-productions. In the months leading up to the handover, we see him romancing bartender Vivian ( Gong Li in her first non-Chinese movie), in the process realising he hardly understands her world at all. 'Sometimes you just fall in love with a place, without really knowing why, without really fully understanding it – the way I fell in love with Vivian,' he admits in voice-over. When he is not mooning over Vivian, John takes to the streets with his camcorder, trying to get to know the real Hong Kong before it is too late. This is how he meets Jean ( Maggie Cheung Man-yuk ), a hustler with a scarred face and stories to tell about the city's underworld. 'She's caught between two worlds with a certain amount of denial of her own identity, and yet she's a great survivor, which is what Hong Kong is,' Wang told entertainment news outlet The AV Club. Jeremy Irons and Maggie Cheung in a still from Chinese Box. John is more prosaic. As the author of a book about making money in Asia, he has the slightly unsavoury air of a Western man in love with an exotic idea of the East. Irons is great at playing this type of character, as shown in David Cronenberg's M. Butterfly (1993), where he plays a French diplomat obsessed with John Lone's Chinese opera singer. The women get a predictably rougher ride. Vivian is in love with Chang ( Michael Hui Koon-man ), a businessman who refuses to marry her because of her past working as a prostitute. Throughout the film, Vivian mostly appears beautifully unobtainable behind a bar, but in an unguarded moment she vamps along to Marlene Dietrich's 'Black Market'. Michael Hui and Gong Li in a still from Chinese Box. Jean, meanwhile, describes harrowing memories of familial sexual assault for one of John's interview tapes. And when John helps her reunite with her high school love, William (Jared Harris), she is shocked that he does not remember her. If Vivian and Jean function more as metaphors for how the West has historically idealised, abused and ignored the East, at least Wang captures the clashing energies of the city itself. From the clattering food stalls to the upscale bars, and the fish markets to the Foreign Correspondents' Club, we see it all, often through the lens of a roving handheld camera. For extra verisimilitude, Wang also splices in news footage, clips of fireworks over Victoria Harbour and even a cheeky shot of the South China Morning Post. Michael Hui, Gong Li and Jeremy Irons in Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong, in 1997. Photo: Dickson Lee And the director does not shy away from politics. The film opens with the staged suicide of a Chinese protester terrified of the forthcoming regime change. We then see drunk expats playing down such worries, calling Hong Kong 'a bloody casino'. As the film continues, there are bomb threats, protests and civil unrest as John and Vivian's slightly underwhelming love story plays out. 'Every day, I would look at the headlines, cut a news clipping out and have Jeremy Irons read it on his desktop,' Wang said. 'At other times, it would be something more subtle, where maybe the Chinese officials are being non-committal about certain things, and I would try to use that as a subconscious, contextual thing for a scene. 'Let's say I was shooting a scene between Gong Li and her boyfriend, and the boyfriend is non-committal about his relationship to her. There are many different levels of trying to capture the mood, the uncertainty and the changes that were going on in the city.' Michael Hui, Jeremy Irons and Gong Li in a still from Chinese Box. To begin with, John is blasé about the handover. 'This great big department store is just having a change of management, that's all,' he says. But by the film's close, once he has loved, lost and come to understand Hong Kong better, he sees things more philosophically. 'Everything in this city has always been changing,' he tells us, and the handover is just another stage in its life cycle. There is a lot to unpack – perhaps too much for a 99-minute movie. What Wang shows so beautifully is that Hong Kong is a city of many sides – no matter who it belongs to. Want more articles like this? Follow SCMP Film on Facebook Advertisement
Business Times
14-05-2025
- Business
- Business Times
Sembcorp's renewables business could power earnings upside; Goldman Sachs initiates at ‘buy'
[SINGAPORE] Goldman Sachs has initiated coverage of energy and urban solutions provider Sembcorp Industries with a 'buy' recommendation and a target price of S$8.40 on the back of its 'solid business model'. The target price implies a potential upside of 27.9 per cent from Sembcorp's closing price of S$6.57 on Tuesday (May 13). In a May 8 report, Goldman Sachs analysts Nikhil Bhandari and Wayne Wang noted that Sembcorp is 'attractively valued', with the market pricing its renewables business at a level aligned with its peers in China and developed markets. 'Despite the company's China exposure, where curtailment rates are rising, we believe the current valuation is overly punitive,' the analysts said. 'Sembcorp is rapidly expanding in regions with more favourable dynamics, such as India and the Middle East, where renewables are cheaper on the power cost curve, and in areas like the Philippines and the UK, where power supply demand is tight,' they added. 'This expansion drives faster earnings growth compared to China and developed market peers.' In addition, Goldman Sachs forecasts that China's share of Sembcorp's renewables capacity, on an equity-adjusted basis, will fall from 48 per cent in 2024 to 26 per cent by 2028. Meanwhile, India's share is expected to rise to 46 per cent. BT in your inbox Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox. Sign Up Sign Up 'We believe that maintaining a presence and relationships in China, albeit reduced, could provide synergies to the ex-China business through upstream sourcing capabilities for round-the-clock projects, especially batteries, which are a key bottleneck in regions like India,' said Bhandari and Wang. The way the analysts see it, Sembcorp's profit after tax could increase at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of close to 14 per cent from 2024 through to 2028. They believe some 70 per cent of profits could come from fixed return contracts – with an average duration of over five years – that offer higher returns compared to its utility and renewables peers. For the full year ended Dec 31, 2024, Sembcorp reported earnings of S$1.01 billion, up 7 per cent from S$942 million the previous year. Net profit before exceptional items and discontinued operation was S$1.02 billion, comparable to financial year 2023, despite a planned major maintenance in the first half of 2024. Goldman Sachs sees several key catalysts for driving a continued rerating of Sembcorp's valuation. These include an optimisation of its portfolio, steady capacity growth, and a potential upward revision of its long-term return on equity guidance. 'Sembcorp has consistently optimised its portfolio through capital recycling and its share price has historically reacted positively to such transactions,' the analysts said. 'Overall, we believe the company will continue to optimise its portfolio to position the core renewables and gas divisions for growth and higher returns.' DBS Group Research analyst Ho Pei Hwa believes Sembcorp could see an uplift in its price-to-earnings valuation multiple, on the back of accretive acquisitions in new renewable markets, steady earnings delivery and potential capital recycling that is value-unlocking. 'Sembcorp is set to deliver promising earnings CAGR of more than 10 per cent through 2028 as its three key business segments enter expansion mode,' Ho said in a report following Sembcorp's FY2024 results, noting that the company is 'firing on all cylinders'. DBS has a 'buy' call on Sembcorp with a target price of S$8. Meanwhile, HSBC Global Research analyst Rahul Bhatia sees Sembcorp as 'a good defensive play in current uncertain times'. 'We think a combination of high power generation capacity, direct access to gas (via import licence) and availability of green power gives Sembcorp a strong position in the Singapore market,' Bhatia said in an Apr 15 report. 'Further, we note a large portion of Sembcorp's group profit – about 77 per cent – is backed by long-term power purchase agreements,' he added.
