ROB CHIHHWEN LO

California Institute of the Arts

Rob Chihwen Lo received a MFA degree at California Institute of the Arts, and a BFA degree at Taiwan University. As a director, SAG-AFTRA actor, and animator in TV/Film, theater, and commercials, his works have screened at film festivals, including Taipei, Slamdance, Athens, Uppsala, Rome, Cambridge, Raindance, Los Angeles Asian Pacific, DGA, Beijing Film Academy. A Doll’s Hug has won awards at DC Asian Pacific American Film Festival, Madrid International Film Festival and  Hong Kong Arthouse Film Festival.

A Doll’s Hug | Experimental | 15 Mins

Domestic violence, school violence, and societal violence continually challenge and threaten the Taiwanese teenage boy, XiangYu. He seeks to escape from the undesirable reality to take shelter in his imaginary Barbie doll world; perhaps another real world. He learns to fight back to seek solutions for everlasting redemption. 

MICHAEL YU

Emerson College

After studying film production at Emerson College in Boston, Michael Yu travelled to Los Angeles to pursue a life in filmmaking. Since then, he has become part of the award-winning visual effects team at CoSA VFX. He loves being able to use visual effects as a tool to tell stories that take place in other worlds and time periods, such as the fan film he directed in 2016, Kid Flash: Running West, which resonated with hundreds of thousands of comic book fans around the world. 

A Good Man is Hard To Be 《好人难当》 ｜ Short Narrative ｜ 11:30

Restaurant owner and father Sammy finds himself fending for his life one day when three dangerous criminals pass by threatening his family. Led by the mysterious Misfit, they push Sammy into making decisions that will show his true colors.

KRISTIE KO

University of Southern California

Kristie Ko is a director from Hong Kong. Inspired by her early love of art, theatre, and the indie films of Pang Ho Cheung, she quickly realized that cinema was the perfect hybrid of the all three art forms. A graduate of the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts, her thesis film Red Hot Frog has screened at Asians on Film Festival, USC First Look, and NFFTY.

Anchor Baby | Short Narrative | 14:58

Lana, a young woman from Hong Kong, faces an unplanned pregnancy. In order to hide her pregnancy from her parents, she travels to LA to give birth, determined to survive on her own. But Lana strikes an unlikely friendship with Mae, the owner of the Korean nail salon down the street. As the months pass, the two mothers grow closer, until generational and cultural differences come between them.

ZUXIANG ZHAO 赵祖祥

New York University

Zuxiang was born and raised in Beijing. He graduated from New York University Tisch School of the Arts in 2014 with a bachelor degree in filmmaking. He also attended Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts (FAMU) in Prague while in college. He has written, directed, and shot multiple shorts in China, U.S and Czech. The first feature film he worked as a cinematographer, THIS IS SANLITUN, got into Toronto International Film Festival. Zuxiang has just finished his director debut feature in Beijing.

A Test 《考试》 ｜ Short Narrative ｜ 20:01

Several days before the College Entrance Exam, high school teacher Chen Jun is informed by An, the school’s top student Lee’s sister, that their father was killed in a mining accident. With Lee’s future in mind, and taking pressured from both the school principal and his family, Chen Jun struggles whether he should tell Lee the news.

ANCHI SHEN 安琪

California Institute of the Arts

Born in Taipei, Taiwan, Anchi is currently studying character animation at CalArts. Her recent works include Sisters, Coyote and Barry. Anchi wrapped up her internship in August at Walt Disney Animation Studios and is now working on her thesis film.

Barry 《小羊贝礼》 | Short Animation | 04:16

A well educated goat with a great passion in his profession goes job hunting and faces the most honest yet brutal challenges reality gives him.

PENGPENG DU 杜鹏鹏

Pratt Institute

Pengpeng Du ,his work CAGE has been selected out in the Student Academy Award.

Cage 《折枝》 ｜ Experimental & Animation｜04:26

Life is liberty in a CAGE represents a situation that is filled with a lot of constraints ,or a habit or an addiction that is hard to get rid of.This project is to present a Chinese cultural and traditional visual style to audiences.On the other hand,CAGE tries to inspire them to recall their memory and consider what is the meaning of life to them individually.

LIYING MEI 梅俪潆

University of Southern California

Mei Liying is a writer/director who grew up in Wuhan and Beijing, China. She has a MFA degree from School of Cinematic Arts, University of Southern California and a BA degree on Communication Studies and Film Studies from Northeastern University.

Mei’s documentary short AMITABHA, which explores contemporary Chinese Buddhism, was nominated for China’s prestigious Gold Panda Award for Best Documentary. Her fiction short films NAACH and ONE DAY were awarded and screened at film festivals across the world.

Mei is now working on the post production for her feature length documentary WHCP, about the controversial Needle Exchange Program for drug abuser in Washington Heights, New York City. She is also finishing her light comedy MUTATA, about a woman’s encounter with her inner child. In 2017, Mei is co-writing for LUNA, a film developed at Warner Brothers Emerging Directors Program.

Cocoon 《茧》 ｜ Narrative | 25:50

11-year-old Qingqing is on the cusp of adolescence, she lives with her mom in the peaceful city of Wuhan. Her father, who works in Shenzhen, comes home only once a month. Qingqing and her friends are beginning to discover the opposite sex, and each other. When Qingqing discoverS her mom’s oddly close relationship with a female friend, she starts stalking them, only to discover a secret that will unravel her peaceful family life, and all her burgeoning conceptions about love, sex, and female desire.

SHIH-CHIEH CHIU 邱士杰

University of Southern California

Director Shih-Chieh Chiu was born in Taipei. He has a MFA degree from the Department of Multimedia and Animation Arts, National Taiwan University of Arts. He had also attended the University of Southern California one year for further studies. The style of his animation varies: his works include the stop-motion Tomato Adventure and the 3D computer animation PSYPATH, among other creations produced via diverse techniques. Chiu had won the second place in Brazil’s Anim!Arte Film Festival in the category of “world cultures – professionals”. Chiu has recently evolved in his style, from making animations for children, to now creating stories regarding personal experiences and more mature subjects.

Fundamental 《基石》 ｜ Experimental & Animation | 07:10

This is the story of a teenager who discovers the strange and terrifying reality behind fundamentalism. Warped into an ultra-religious environment from a young age, his surroundings force him to adhere to a rigid and sometimes irrational world-view. When he gathers the courage to leave his faith behind, and sees that human existence is actually a more nuanced experience than the black and white reality in which he grew up in.

JOSEPH CHEN-CHIEH HSU 许承杰

New York University

Born and raised in Taiwan, Joseph Chen-Chieh HSU received his bachelor degree in Engineering and System Science from National Tsing Hua University. He attended New York University Tisch Asia and acquired his MFA in Film Production. He was an alumnus at Talents Tokyo in 2014 and Kyoto Filmmaker Lab in 2015.

Joseph had abundant experience in international productions. He participated in over 20 short films' productions in South Korea, Japan, Nepal, Singapore and Taipei. His documentary short film, People’s Champ, screened at Shnit International Film Festival in Switzerland in 2013. His short film, The Lobster Kid (2015), received a post-production grant from NYU. It screened at over 25 international film festivals, such as Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia and Toronto Reel Asian Film Festival. And it won the Best Short Film at Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival. His latest short film Guo Mie (2017) was selected as the finalist of the 44th Student Academy Awards.

Guo Mie 《孤味》 ｜ Narrative | 30:03

A karaoke-addicted elderly woman struggles with her self-worth and a sense of betrayal at her long-lost husband's funeral where she encounters his younger and more sophisticated girlfriend. At the same time,  she finds out her children might have been secretly kept in touch with him all these years.

QIHONG WEIi 魏齐鸿

School of Visual Arts

Qihong Wei is a narrative film writer/director from Shanghai, China. He was a Group Creative Director in an international advertising agency before 2016. With a passion for movies, he decided to follow his dream and started studying film directing at SVA. As a filmmaker, Qihong is most interested in Sci-Fi, the genre that has rarely been touched by Chinese directors.

ISABELLA | Narrative | 13:30

Maria, an Artificial Intelligence expert working for a domestic maid-robot company, investigates an anomalously singing robot that leads to the discovery of the company’s secret.

FENG-I FIONA ROAN 阮凤仪

American Film Institute

Born in Taipei, Taiwan and raised in Salem, Oregon, Feng-I received her Directing MFA degree from AFI and was previously trained in classical Chinese Literature at National Taiwan University. Her latest work JIEJIE won the HBO Asian Pacific American Visionary Award and will be distributed by HBO starting May 7th, 2018. 

Feng-I's bilingual works focus on female protagonists and family relationships. Her autobiographical short film JIEJIE will compete in the International Asian Section this year in Short Shorts & Asia Film Festival(Tokyo), and is also selected by Palm Springs International Festival for Short Films, LAAPFF, Cleveland, St. Paul Minneapolis, Athens, and Ashland Film Festival.

JIE JIE 《姐姐》 ｜ Narrative | 15:32

Embarrassed by her un-American look, Fen betrays her younger sister on their first day at church, fueling an unprecedented outburst since their immigration.

CE LIANG 梁策

Chapman University

Liang Ce is a Chinese filmmaker whose most recent work The Monkey King is in Town was nominated for a Student Emmy Award. His works mostly focus on characters that are marginalized in some way, struggling to find their place in society. Liang earned an MFA in Directing from the prestigious Dodge Film School at Chapman University. There, he received the Leo Freedman Foundation Grant for his thesis film, In Search of Paul and was selected for the highly competitive Marion Knott Scholar Program to be mentored by legendary director Michael Apted.

In Search of Paul 《寻找保罗》 ｜ Narrative ｜ 18:19

Johnny shuts himself off from everyone else since he lost his beloved grandma. Meanwhile, he centers his life around a tortoise named Paul. One day, Paul disappears out of the thin air. Johnny begins desperately looking for him…

ZION CHEN 陈筠衡

University of Southern California

Zion Chen is an animator graduated from University of Southern California - Digital Arts and Animation major. He is currently pursuing master degree at School of Visual Arts - Computer Arts major. Zion likes stories related to psychedelic dream and reality, psychological thriller and folk legends. Creating a world that connects daily lives with fantasy is what he likes. 

INN 《栈》 Experimental & Animation | 04:24

When a weird-acting girl draws a young man's attention in the inn.

JIAYUAN LIU 刘佳源

University of Southern California

Jiayuan Liu was born in Guangzhou, China. She got her M.F.A from USC, School of Cinematic Arts. Besides writing/directing, Jiayuan is also a CG artist, who worked in several VFX companies. Jiayuan is passionate about storytelling and digital art. Last year, Jiayuan's short film Dear Mamá has won gold award in Big heart Small film Competition held by Alibaba Media Groups. Her recent short film Kintsugi has got into LA Shorts Fest as an official selection and 45th Student Academy as a semifinalist. She is now developing her first feature.

Kintsugi 《金缮》 ｜ Narrative ｜ 14:48

A little girl finds an unexpected way to connect to the memory of her late grandmother, with the help of a mysterious friend.

CHENGLIN XIE 谢承霖

University of Southern California

Chenglin Xie is an award-winning filmmaker and animation artist. His film Life Smartphone  has won Gold Medal of 44th Student Academy Awards® at International Animation Category, been in shortlist for Best Animated Shorts of  90th Academy Awards® , and was nominated for 43rd Annie Award in the category for "Best Student Film."

Life Smartphone 《低头人生》 ｜ Animation | 03:06

Staring at the Smart phone all the time, people are gradually alienating themselves from the normal life and people nearby. This film, with its satirical and humorous style, serves to depict the current social situation and give people a chance to be introspective.

YIYING (NIKKI) LI 李怡瑛

University of Southern California

Received her MFA from the School of Cinematic Arts at USC, Yiying (Nikki) Li has a strong passion for telling stories about compelling characters rooted in underrepresented communities. Her graduate thesis Love & Loss has recently won the 45th Student Academy Award. It has also been nominated as Best Documentary in 42th Montreal World Film Festival Student Film Festival. She also serves in a student club that teaches cancer kids from 5-15 years old how to make a small film. She believes the mission of art is to make the world a little better.

Love & Loss 《山间一日》 ｜ Documentary | 21:53

Love & Loss follows two surprisingly strong women: Karen Crespo & Nicole Evans. Both women are vibrantly physically disabled. Through the observation of the dating lives of them, this film explores the challenging and often unconventional intimate relationships of physically-impaired individuals, as well as how those individuals define and live their lives within the context of their disabilities.

GEORGIA FU

New York University

Born in Taipei, Taiwan and immigrated to California with her parents when she was two years old, Georgia found cinema as a way into understanding American culture, and ever since then she has had an avid passion for seeing life through a film lens. For her undergraduate degree, she attended New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts for Cinema Studies with a minor in in East Asian studies in New York. On the side she gained valuable working experience at the production company ThinkFilm, and for the producer Barbara DeFina (Goodfellas). After New York, she spent a year and a half relearning Chinese at the National Taiwan University and completed her graduate studies at NYU’s Tisch Asia in Singapore, with a concentration in directing. Her last short film, “Gigantic”, made while at NYU’s Tisch Asia, screened at the Slamdance Film Festival and was nominated for the Gold Hugo award as “Best Short Film” at the Chicago International Film Festival.

MISS WORLD | Narrative | 19:00

Jane, a young Taiwanese woman has come home from the U.S. to spend time with her father before he has to go to prison. On her father's last day of freedom, Jane experiences the worst day of her life. Jane learns she has to come to terms with her own personal issues, before she can finally say goodbye.

ZESHENG GAO 高泽生

New York Film Academy

Zesheng Gao is an aspiring Asian director who studied script-writing and film production in China, London and the U.S. He has been not only a world traveller, but a boxer, a musician and a soccer player, a journalist, a waiter and a filmmaker as well. All these experiences make him a life explorer who always tries to see better, think more and feel deeper.

With his background as a journalist, Zesheng believes that film is art, but it's more than art. He wants to make films that embrace serious topics so the audience can reflect on them. While studying script writing at Royal Holloway University of London, he focused on advancing his writing skills so he could put his thoughts onto paper. After that, he went to the U.S for further education in film production so he could fulfill his dream of making his scripts alive.

OVERWATCHED 《阅界》 | Narrative |16:04

Ben browses live-streaming shows, just to kill time. Two hosts catch his eyes: one is Lowry, a teenage boy, who got bullied in school and had his everything exposed online; the other one is Britney, a gogo dancer trying to earn more money through the Internet. Small malignity is leading to huge tragedy…

YUNG-JAE CHEN 陈永杰

Dartmouth College

YUNG-JAE CHEN (Writer, Director, Producer) is a Chinese-American filmmaker born and raised in the Greater Bay Area. RUNNER is his debut short as writer and director. Yung-Jae has 7 years of experience working in the commercial, advertising and media industry. In the past several years, he’s led story-first commercials and campaigns for the likes of Google, Activision, NVIDIA, and more. He received his double BA in Film & Media Studies and Political Science from Dartmouth College.

RUNNER | Narrative | 24:51

Steeped in elements home to San Francisco – fog, wind, and rock – RUNNER disentangles the psyche of one woman training for the most important run of her life, one she cannot win, but one that will ultimately atone for her past.

JIAGE TONG 佟佳格

The City University of New York

Jiage Tong is a female director and scriptwriter from China. She finished her literature degree in Shanghai Theater Academy, and her working covers films, TV Shows and theater. After she got into City College of New York, she focuses on filmmaking, hoping to bring great films that expose human nature. Tong put a lot of effort in her thesis film SEVENTY: she went back and forth between the U.S. and China for three times and scouted fifteen villages. In December 2017, she spent half a month living in a remote village with her team and finished the shooting in -8ºF condition. 

SEVENTY 《七十》 ｜ Narrative ｜ 13:46

Wang Shun is a seventy-year-old single man, who lives on collecting scraps in a backward village. Nobody cares about him. After his old dog dies, Wang Shun starts to plan a funeral for himself in advance, which will cost all his savings. This funeral for a living man makes Wang Shun a celebrity in the village.

YING LU

New York University

Originally from Guangzhou, China, Ying Lu is a documentary filmmaker and freelance video journalist based in New York. Her work focuses on stories of marginalized people, and stories between different cultures. After graduating from News and Documentary program at New York University, her thesis film Slow Angels has won the 38th College Television Awards: Loreen Arbus Focus on Disability.

SLOW ANGELS | Documentary | 33:06

In China, if you can’t walk on your own, you can’t go to school. It is not a policy, but a mentality of the society. Slow Angels profiles three families with children with cerebral palsy from different background in Shenzhen, as they set off on distinct but similar paths to overcome the disability and struggle to not be segregated by the society.

JINZHI DU 杜尽知 JINYUE WAN 万晋玥

University of Southern California

Jinzhi Du is a CG artist and a teacher in the animation department of Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology. He has worked as a CG artist/ Pre-vis artist for films, advertisement and music videos in American film and animation industry, such as Ready for it(2017) of Taylor Swift, X-men: Dark Phoenix(2019), the videos of Star Wars(2022) for Disney World, Florida.

Jinyue Wan is a multi-skilled artist, responsible for storyboard, concept design, 2D/3D animation, 3D surfacing and art direction. Wan has kept doing individual animation films for 7 years. Her first short film Classwork was exhibited in Annecy animation festival in 2011. Her most recently finished film The Wind won the Best Picture Award in the 8th We Like ‘Em Short.

The Girl and The Serpent 《蛇祸》 ｜ Animation | 6:20

In Eastern China, a serpent lives in the low lying land at the base of a tall mountain. Every year, a young girl is brought to the serpent's den as a sacrificial offering to protect the villagers - until one day, a female warrior challenges him.

RANDY WANG 王培纯

Art Center College of Design

Started studying filmmaking in the U.S. since 2014, Randy has always loved making suspense/thrillers and favored fast-paced films. As a writer/director, Randy considers telling good stories as his all-time goal. Rany is currently a film student at Art Center College of Design. 

THE GIRL IN THE GARAGE 《被困在车库里的女孩》

A 20 years old Chinese international student living in San Francisco, finds herself in a dark garage and handcuffed in her own car after an attack that happened in her campus parking lot.

AMY WANG

American Film Institute

Amy Wang is a Chinese-Australian filmmaker who grew up in the suburbs of Sydney, Australia. Her unique perspective often as an outsider fuels her passion for stories about social isolation and the human condition. Upon graduation, Amy worked as a promos producer, where she directed shoots for X Factor Australia and worked on shows such as Criminal Minds, Downton Abbey and How to Get Away with Murder. She is currently developing a limited series aimed at humanizing social pariahs and two features exploring two extremely flawed women. She is repped by Kaplan/Perrone in Los Angeles.

UNNATURAL 《非自然》 | Narrative | 29:50

Desperate to escape his past, James, a reclusive teenager moves into a new town with his strict parents. He befriends Izzy, a rebellious girl from his class. She is a breath of fresh air and offers James the freedom and friendship he’s longed for his entire life. But James has a secret —— a secret so destructive that it could put his life in danger.