Films

Off the Menu: Asian America
(2015, 56 min., directed by Grace Lee)

What exactly does food reflect about Asian Pacific Americans? Off the Menu: Asian America grapples with how family, tradition, faith, and geography shape our relationship to food. The film takes audiences on a journey from Texas to New York and from Wisconsin to Hawaii using our obsession with food as a launching point to delve into a wealth of stories, traditions, and unexpected characters that help nourish our communities. Off the Menu is a road trip into the kitchens, factories, temples and farms of Asian Pacific America that explores how our relationship to food reflects our evolving communities.

Growers of Color: From the Killing Fields to the Healing Fields (2023, 10 min., Connecticut Museum of Culture and History) [this is the full film, not trailer]

After losing access to her farmland during the pandemic, Vicheth rediscovered her purpose by tending to the land alongside her parents and their dream home. Born to Cambodian genocide survivors, her earliest memories were molding red clay as a child in a refugee camp in Thailand and coming home to an empty house in New London. Her parents had worked tirelessly and proudly in custodial and dining services at Connecticut College, enabling Vichet to get her college degree, and helping her siblings become home-owners. Now in retirement, with time on their side, she and her parents have started an incredible intergenerational journey that lifts the human spirit. Join farmer Vicheth on her journey of connection, healing, and new beginnings as her family connects over food, memories, and sustainable agriculture.

Making Waves: The Rise of Asian America (2024, 58 min., directed by Jon Osaki and Josh Chuck)

Making Waves: The Rise of Asian America explores the vital role of Ethnic Studies in redefining the narrative and promoting service to Asian American communities across the country. From the birth of Ethnic Studies at UC Berkeley and San Francisco State to present-day movements. Making Waves documents the stories of Asian American activism and efforts to lift up Ethnic Studies as a strategy to address present and future waves of anti-Asian hate.

New Wave Documentary (2024, 1 hr. 28 min., directed by Elizabeth Ai) (not Rated)
New Wave captures the vibrant spirit of the New Wave musical phenomenon that electrified Vietnamese American teens in the 1980s. The filmmaker’s exploration of the rebellion and freedom associated with this subculture became a resonating narrative of identity, loss, and healing. In Orange County, California, the musical novelty of New Wave sound and aesthetics provided a sanctuary for a generation of refugee youth grappling with the weight of their parents’ unspoken traumas.

Vietnamerica (2015, 1 hr. 30 min., directed by Scott Edwards) (not Rated)
Vietnamerica follows martial arts master Nguyen Tien Hoa’s quest for emotional closure more than three decades after he and his family had escaped from Vietnam as boat people. Hoa’s boat was captured and assaulted by Thai pirates and he became the sole survivor of the 75-passenger vessel. After establishing a new life in the United States, Master Hoa returned to Thailand and Malaysia in search of the graves of his wife and two children. The film also highlights the stories of other Vietnamese Americans who created new lives on American soil and the challenges that they have overcome.