The Panama (1996) is a documentary film chronicling the Chan family of Victoria, B.C. One of the oldest Chinese families in Victoria, they owned and operated several restaurants, ending with the Panama Cafe on Government Street from around 1930 until 1967. Chan Dun, at the age of twelve, landed in Victoria in the 1880s, and [...]
Lee Hon Ming
After shutting the shop doors and washing the smell of fatigue and salt fish from his body, Lee Hon Ming, known in the town of Old Harbour, Jamaica, as Charley Lee, would cast his mind back to the classic poetry he imbibed as a youth in China and continue to compose poems in [...]
In the first half of the 20th century, Japan extended its imperialist hegemony over China. During the Second World War, Japan occupied the eastern half of China. During China’s War of Resistance against Japan in WWII (193-1945), my mother and I faced many desperate times, but there [...]
Another Day in America (1989) profiles three Japanese-American women artists. These are painters Grace Munakata and Rumi Sakata and saxophonist Jan Yonemoto. It examines the uniqueness of these painters and musicians in the new world. The film illustrates the diversity of California’s creative community, and enhances the public’s awareness of the Japanese American community as [...]
A film profile of four Chinese cafe owners and their families living and flourishing in Outlook, Humboldt, and Eston, Saskatchewan. It looks at the role of women and sexism, historical and contemporary racism, business acumen, civic spirit and neighborhood relations. Includes a segment on Wayne Mah, the prairie’s only Chinese-Canadian mayor in 1985. Rare still [...]
America’s war in Vietnam is over. But the scars of that war remain with many Asian Americans who were sent there. More than 60,000 Asian Americans served in the United States armed forces during the Vietnam War. Many who lived through this lost war in Southeast Asian still suffer silently from post traumatic stress disorder. [...]
Toronto-based Keith Lock continues his passion for family continuity and his respect for Chinese culture in this short film, Dreaming House, shot entirely in Toronto.
The Dreaming House from Keith Lock on Vimeo.
Keith graduated from York University with a M.F.A in film and has produced many documentaries and short films. His earlier works include a documentary [...]
The wonderment about the Tucson sunset was how it was able to spread directly over the horizon causing many silhouettes of three armed cacti to leisurely spring up. Seconds after the sun fell into the earth’s crevices, I could hear the desert settling like remnants of dried leaves crackling at the bottom of a well-handled [...]
D’Ann Grace is an English major at San Jose State University, but considering branching out into the Navy or Air Force in order to travel and see the world before settling down. She has always been writing. It’s something that has always made her think. If she can help others [...]
Honesty. Fairness. Hard work. These are the guiding principles for Diana Dai 戴小平who won Canada’s prestigious Gemini Award in 2009 for producing the television documentary about the Sichuan earthquake, “China’s Earthquake: the People in the Pictures.”
It was her hard work that got her the initial contact with [...]