Movies: Visual Communications

The film looks back at the life of a man named Oda and other Japanese Americans through the decades as they face great challenges and joys living in the United States....

Celebrates the music and influences of contemporary Asian American culture on Dan Kuramoto, June Okida Kuramoto, and Johnny Mori — three musicians who make up the core of the jazz fusion band Hiroshima. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partn...

Modern kite maker Tom Joe seeks to preserve the craft of kite making as well as the traditional Asian folklore behind it. Alan Takemoto illustrates Tom Joe’s tales of the Polynesian fish kite made from leaves and branches to fool fish; the Chinese ge...

For all intents and purposes, 2015 was seemingly a banner year for singer/songwriter Bobby Choy (aka Big Phony). His melodic and quiet songs had garnered him a following as he performs at SXSW while also starring in his first feature film. However, r...

Living in the USA illegally for over 20 years, Miko Revereza reflects on his family's relocation from Manila to Los Angeles in this introspective essay film. Patching together self-portraiture and home-movie footage, his sombre yet resolute voice-ove...

An aspiring social worker, Pedro must confront political restrictions as a blind, undocumented immigrant to get his college degree and support his family. But when attaining his dreams leads to new and unexpected challenges, what will Pedro do?...

In the face of AAPI violence, an intergenerational coalition of Black, Indigenous, Latinx, Asian, People of Color organizers come together to organize a march across historic Washington Heights and Harlem, as a continuation of the historic and radica...

Raya loves makeup but her family does not. She’s torn between her secret dream of being a makeup artist and her family’s strict religious beliefs. In a nightmare, she receives a profound message from her Papua New Guinean ancestor who encourages her ...

This important tribute to the issei (first generation Japanese Americans) integrates the stories of three people who describe a collective history through their personal memories....

After the trigger of a hate crime, an undocumented Indian American convenience store clerk comes crashing into his subconscious as he grieves the passing of his father during an attempted border crossing....

1935 Los Angeles, community leader Sei Fujii uncovers the corrupt activities of his community's underground mafia. He must choose between saving the face of his deteriorating community and confronting the issues head on through his newspaper. Based o...

A young woman contends with her role as a Daughter of Guam. Contemplating the inherited burden of her island’s collective loss, the Daughter of Guam learns to navigate her responsibility to her island’s collective healing....

Inspired by the 1978 documentary “Omai Fa’atasi: Samoa Mo Samoa,” a teenage girl growing up in a strict Samoan household lives the same day everyday cooking, cleaning, and taking care of her siblings until she joins a community organization that help...

After Dom begins having suspicions about his wife, he goes to the seemingly wrong person for advice, leading him down a rabbit hole of drug fueled paranoia that threatens his mind, his heart, and his groin....

A follow-up to the groundbreaking Visual Communications documentary OMAI FA'ATASI: SAMOA MO SAMOA, this fictionalized account of Vaitafe Futu, a gifted Samoan youth who travels from Pago Pago to pursue an education in Los Angeles offers a wholistic p...

June Pouesi, director of the Office of Samoan Affairs, describes the waves of immigration from American Samoa that led to the development of the Samoan community. She also comments on VC’s photo documentation of work, cultural performances and youth ...

This documentary tells the story of the LGBTTI communities who have suffered persecution, prison and torture for their sexual condition under different military dictatorships in recent decades. The idea borns from the photographic and archival projec...

In 1953, a young man in Los Angeles wrote to a young woman in St. Louis. The letters between the pen pals evolved into a courtship that spanned over four years....

Documentary on the Los Angeles-based media arts group, Visual Communications. The one-hour film chronicles their first twenty years, 1970-1990, of producing media by and about Asian Pacific Americans....

NA PUA O LAKA foregrounds the perpetuation of the Hawaiian culture in Southern California. Sissy Kaʻio is a kumu hula, or teacher of Hula, who both explains and demonstrates how to teach the Hula. The focus is on her male students, which harks back t...