The main leg of the 9th Annual San Diego Asian Film Festival closed down with a bang last Thursday, with the Closing Night screening of Always 2: Sunset on Third Street. Here's the list of this year's winners, presented last weekend at the festival's Awards Gala:
Best Animation
Meat Days directed by Joe Hsieh
Special Jury Honor
Damn the Past! directed by Julie Kang
Best Dramatic Narrative Short
Moon Lady directed by Wendy Cheng
Best Feature Documentary
Shame directed by Mohammed Naqvi
Best Narrative Feature
Santa Mesa directed by Ron Morales
Grand Jury Award
Dirty Hands: The Art and Crimes of David Choe directed by Harry Kim
Lifetime Achievement Award
Soon-Tek Oh
Congratulations to all the winners. I actually had the chance to see Harry Kim's Dirty Hands during the festival. It defies description. It's an incredible, challenging, fascinating documentary portrait artist David Choe, who has created quite a reputation for himself over the last couple of years as an artistic genius, a criminal, a rebel. I loved it, and highly recommend it.
But wait! The festival ain't over quite just yet. For those of you in Riverside County, you actually have the chance to see the film, along with a bunch of other cool workds, when SDAFF moves north this week for its Riverside expansion, October 21-23 at the Ultrastar Cinemas (formerly University Village Cinemas).
Films screening in Riverside include Dirty Hands, Benson Lee's Planet B-Boy, Amyn Kaderali's Kissing Cousins, and Jessica Yu's Ping Pong Playa, among others. And select screenings are actually free to UCR students! Very cool. Spread the word, and check it out. For the full schedule of Riverside screenings, go here.
