San Diego Asian Film Festival Spring Showcase

A week-long presentation of Asian cinema
A Production of Pacific Arts Movement, presenters of the San Diego Asian Film Festival

Schedule of Events:

5:30 pm - 90 mins - Sunshine

Her name is Sunshine, and she’s on the verge of making the Philippine Olympic team as a rhythmic gymnast. The personal, national, and filial glory come crashing down with the unwanted discovery that Sunshine is also pregnant. Her struggle for a solution forward reveals society’s deep-rooted lengths to hold her back, when suddenly Sunshine is mysteriously met by a strange little girl with a knack for being wherever Sunshine happens to be.

Maris Racal navigates the title role with a dire grace. What hurts most, as director Antoinette Jadaone (Fan Girl, Spring Showcase ’21) spellbindingly ensures we know and feel, is that no part of Sunshine’s story is inconceivable at all. The external pressures surrounding abortion in Manila beat down like a biblical whipping. The internal fears which result bear the same textured scars as a nation touched by Catholicism as a colonial tool. But real choices and real beliefs are rooted in compassion, something Sunshine won’t ever let us forget.

7:30 pm - 85 mins - Lucky Star

Dad is a reformed gambler, but the relapse is coming. He has secret cash stacks around the house, and he’s borrowing money from his college-aged daughter. A speeding ticket accelerates his cravings. A breaking point is coming. And his name is Lucky, which might be the greatest curse of all.

He’s played by an excellent Terry Chen, who rocks tattoos of old glory days and drives a sports car bought in better times. Gillian McKercher’s tense drama captures the gambler’s daze, but more impressively, the fate of a man who doesn’t know how to accept help, be that financial or emotional, from the people who are the real fortune in his life.

9:40 pm - 90 mins - Mystery Kung Fu Theater

In life, we make mysteries. In death, we make theater.

Click here to Buy Tickets