For over two decades, the New York Asian Film Festival has been an adrenaline defibrillator jolting audiences out of their seats. The 2024 edition promises to be no different: a 17-day gamma blast of Asia's most electrifying voices and visions! From the opening night cheerleader gem Victory, to the centerpiece assassin anthology The Killers and the climactic action nirvana closer Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In; from blockbusters to indie treasures, NYAFF showcases Asia's most groundbreaking movies and a whole new generation of auteurs, capturing the zeitgeist of contemporary Asian society. As the clarion call for greater Asian representation grows, NYAFF has been at the forefront of the fight, providing a vital platform for all kinds of stories and storytellers.
The 23rd NYAFF will offer an insanely stacked East-meets-edgy feast of films, and a defiant celebration of storytelling's power.
Celebrating its 22nd edition in 2023, the New York Asian Film Festival (NYAFF) is North America’s leading festival of Asian cinema. It was called “the best film festival in New York” by The Village Voice and “arguably the world’s best-curated program of new and classic Asian cinema” by IndieWire. Launched in 2002, the festival showcases a wildly diverse lineup of singular titles each year, ranging from mainstream blockbusters and art-house eccentricities to genre and cult classics. It was the first North American film festival to champion the works of Johnnie To, Bong Joon Ho, Park Chan-wook, Takashi Miike, and other auteurs of contemporary Asian cinema. Notable festival guests have included Lee Byung-hun, Ryoo Seung-wan, Masami Nagasawa, Sammo Hung, Lee Jung-jae, and Jackie Chan. Since 2010, NYAFF has been produced in collaboration with Film at Lincoln Center.
NYAFF remains fully committed to increasing exposure of Asian representation on screen and providing opportunities for audiences of all communities to experience the diversity and brilliance of Asian and Asian American cinema. The 20th anniversary lineup will include world, international, North American, U.S., and New York premieres, showcasing the most exhilarating action, comedy, drama, thriller, romance, horror, and art-house films.
“We’re thrilled to be back fully in person after two years, the best and only way to really have a festival, in my view,” said Samuel Jamier, Executive Director of NYAFF and President of the New York Asian Film Foundation. “We’ve been really impressed with the quality and diversity of films made during the trying times of the pandemic, and we’re especially excited that we can once again welcome guests from all over Asia to the stage at FLC, giving them the spotlight they deserve. We look forward to celebrating NYAFF’s 20th anniversary and 20 years of discovering films from half a world away, a region now universally celebrated for its great filmmaking and storytelling, with some of today’s most talented and acclaimed stars and renowned filmmakers.”
The New York Asian Film Festival is pleased to present a deliciously chilling aperitif to cap off our successful 20th edition. Starting immediately after NYAFF’s main course, we will serve up a ten-day virtual series of tasty Taiwanese horror films to celebrate the island nation's traditional Ghost Month.
The Taiwan Ghost Month series will start August 23rd and showcase seven standout genre films, available virtually across the United States.
This series showcases a constellation of domestic box-office hits from recent years that have been critically praised for incorporating Taiwanese folklore, Chinese mythology, contemporary social issues and historical tragedies into their succinctly unnerving narratives.
NYAFF’s 20th edition will kick off at Film at Lincoln Center on August 6 with the in-person international premiere of Ryoo Seung-wan’s tense action thriller Escape from Mogadishu, starring Kim Yoon-seok (NYAFF Star Asia winner 2018) and Zo In-sung. The film is dramatically constructed based on real events that took place in 1991 at the onset of the Somali Civil War, and depicts the perilous escape attempted by North and South Korean embassy workers who were stranded during the conflict. (Well Go USA is releasing the film in the United States and Canada.)
Legendary filmmaker Ann Hui will be the recipient of the Variety Star Asia Lifetime Achievement Award. One of the most critically acclaimed Hong Kong New Wave filmmakers for four decades, Hui has created work of great sensitivity, focusing on themes of cultural displacement, family conflict, and female perspectives. In her honor, NYAFF will be showcasing her early masterwork, The Story of Woo Viet, starring Chow Yun-fat and marking the film’s 40th anniversary, as well as Man Lim Chung’s insightful, delightful portrait of the inimitable Hui, Keep Rolling.
'Tis the Season to run for your life as Korean Cultural Center New York (KCCNY) and the New York Asian Film Festival (NYAFF) are in the giving spirit to present a free streaming series that highlights one of the sweeping film genres to grace the big screen that will aim to leave you dying for more...literally.
What lurks in Winter's breath is the stillness of the undead creeping upon an unknowing populace. Keep your loved ones close and your enemies as a human shield as they take the first bite from a relentless zombie horde! Don't wait up for Santa. He probably didn't make it.
Whether online or offline, the festival continues to highlight women both behind and in front of the camera, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that this 19th edition features a specific focus on women filmmakers: WOMEN TRANSFORMING FILM, starting with the Opening Film. A generous share of the program is devoted to new filmmakers, including striking directorial debuts and sophomore efforts. Integral to NYAFF’s mission is showcasing the Asian cinema vanguard that emerges largely from new talent and fresh voices, and the Festival continues to champion the work of new directors and filmmakers that have not yet received international recognition with its “Uncaged” Competition section
2020 is proving a banner year for Korea: Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite made Oscar history; the nation’s widely praised response to the Coronavirus epidemic made headlines, and now Korean Baseball goes live on ESPN... finally! This is the perfect time for an event that pairs two blockbuster sectors of the entertainment business at which the country excels: Baseball and Cinema. Korean Cultural Center New York (KCCNY) and the New York Asian Film Festival (NYAFF) team up to present a free streaming series that highlights Korea’s glorious sports history, pitching legends, and the peninsula’s favorite baseball teams through a selection of three major films of the genre from July 16 to 26. Whether you’re a KBO League fan or a Korean cinema lover, this exclusive online event offers the thrills that you’ve been craving after months of quarantine.
Eighteen – (and we’re) still “Too Young to Die:” Many will recognize the cheeky reference to NYAFF 2016 audience award winner, Kudo Kankuro’s Too Young to Die!, in which a busload of high-school students plummet to their deaths. They either end up in heaven or hell, both of which defy expectations (and reason). Graduating into adulthood, NYAFF aims to defy expectations cinematically, and has sought the rare gem, the undiscovered treasure, harder than ever, maybe at the risk of losing the plot sometimes!
The reference to the Japanese film, one of the team’s favorites, hints both at this restless search and the resilience of the organization over the years. The festival has grown from a predominantly genre-focused showcase to an event that embraces a wide range of films. Arthouse? Horror? Who cares, as long as it’s good. At eighteen, the festival shares with many teenagers of that age, the passionate (and perhaps obsessive) temperament and the sentiment that we’re not there yet! Whatever “there” might mean. We’re not stopping anywhere.
On February 1-3 & 8-10, join us for the very first NYAFF Winter Showcase as we Rock the Lunar New Year! We're showing the very best in Asian cinema from the recent to the retro! Films are TBA as well as a few other surprises. Stay tuned to our event page for exciting updates!
Our annual survey of essential – and often wild – films is New York’s most exhaustive selection of titles from China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and other countries across Southeast Asia. NYAFF features contemporary premieres and classic titles, plus a host of in-person appearances and Q&As with up-and-coming and established stars and auteurs.
It’s the seventh edition of the Old School Kung Fu Fest, a perennially wild weekend of incredible classic martial arts and action movies, and for this lucky year we’ve got something extra special: “Wonder Women of the Martial Arts,” featuring some of the fiercest female warriors to ever grace kung fu cinema, a wellspring of tough gals. Female empowerment has never been this thrillingly cathartic, so come cheer along stalwart chop-socky heroines such as Angela Mao, Cheng Pei Pei, and Kara Hui Ying Hung as they triumphantly trounce scenery-chewing baddies (mostly misguided macho men, no doubt) with vengeful gusto! Co-presented by Subway Cinema and Metrograph.
Get wooed by die-hard romantics, unnerved by devil children, and bear witness to the fury of angry young men on paths of destruction in the sweet sixteenth edition of the New York Asian Film Festival. Wild cinematic outings that always have something to say about the human condition, this summer’s crop of titles range from the heartwarming to the desperately dark. Dive headfirst into the raging sea of talent from China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and across South East Asia—filmmakers unafraid to take on controversial subjects and explore complex emotions.
The 2015 Village Voice Best Film Festival award winner is back! The 15th edition of the New York Asian Film Festival will feature a full plate of unhinged, genre-bending films, brisk and intelligent entertainment, and uncompromising art-house gems that will satiate all appetites, wholesome and otherwise. Poised to be the summer’s hottest event, the festival will tantalize, shock, and excite with a handpicked crop of disquieting noir, gonzo gangster action, dark romance, and sharp political works that showcase the vibrant range of talent from China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia. The NYAFF will also celebrate its coming-of-age with special retrospective screenings of some of the founders’ and programmers’ favorite works.
North America's leading festival of popular Asian cinema is back with over 50 new films from China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia, featuring World, International, and North American premieres and an all-star lineup of guests, including Hong Kong superstar Aaron Kwok, celebrated director Ringo Lam, and Sometani Shota, a rising star in Japan. The festival will also include a focus on South Korea's pioneering production company Myung Films, and a special joint tribute to Japanese film legends Takakura Ken and Sugawara Bunta, both of whom passed away last November.
It's unlucky number 13! That's right, this year is the 13th New York Asian Film Festival and that means that you're going to walk under a ladder, trip over a black cat, break a mirror, and wind up getting squashed by a falling piano the second you step outside. The only way to stay safe is to double down and make sure you spend your summer inside a movie theater watching eyeball-exploding Asian films.
We're back with the 12th edition of North America's leading festival of popular Asian Cinema! This year's special focuses include New Filipino Cinema, Taiwanese “Black Movies,“ Korean character actor Ryoo Seung-beom, and shout-outs to two of the festival's oldest friends, Well Go USA (the champion of Asian film among U.S. distributors) and the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in New York on the occasion of their 30th birthday.
This year, the New York Asian Film Festival is bringing the crazy back! As ever, our two-fisted lineup is packed with the blockbusters, hit romances, 3-D spectaculars and wild comedies (and, yes, even a few art films) that are packing them in across Asia. And we'll be delivering guests, wild 'n' wooly retrospective screenings, and the contemporary flicks that are scooping up awards and setting the box office on fire in Thailand, Hong Kong, China, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, and Taiwan.
With all-star guests including Tsui Hark, Yamada Takayuki, Ryoo Seung-wan, and many more, the masters of Asian cinema will dazzle us for two action-packed weeks at the Walter Reade Theater. Expect the unexpected as this year's festival focuses on wuxia flying swordsmen and new Korean revenge thrillers!
Like vandals storming the gates of Rome, the New York Asian Film Festival rampages through the Film Society of Lincoln Center's Walter Reade Theater from June 25 to July 8, unleashing an orgy of the latest and greatest pop masterpieces Asian cinema has to offer. For nine years, the NYAFF has been “one of the city's most valuable events“ (The New York Times), a “crazed, capricious, super-freaky mega-mix of art house and grindhouse“ (The Village Voice) and now it invades New York's premier cultural institution with over 40 blockbusters from East Asia: romantic comedies from China, mutant battle girls from Japan, kung fu epics from Hong Kong, and tourist-eating giant pig movies from Korea. With appearances from Sammo Hung, Simon Yam, Huang Bo and Bruce Leung, this year's festival promises to do nothing less than save your moviegoing soul.
The economy. Unemployment. Bank crisis. War. Missiles. Death. Is there any relief from the horrors that surround us? Yes! Like a knight in shining armor, the New York Asian Film Festival is back, charging over the horizon with some 50 brand-new pop masterpieces from Asia ready to bring hope, light and giant monsters into your heart!
The New York Asian Film Festival is back like a bad dream, ready to cleanse the dirt from your soul with a barrage of sparkling, super-powered movies straight out of Asia. It’s a seventeen day orgy of new films from Miike Takashi, Johnnie To, Hur Jin-Ho, Wakamatsu Koji and Aoyama Shinji. Plus, our first-ever documentary (Yasukini) and our first movies from Indonesia (Kala) and Vietnam (The Rebel).
The New York Asian Film Festival 2007 thunders back into town with a herd of rowdy movies that are ready to blow your mind and cleanse your soul. A seventeen day orgy of new films from Park Chan-Wook, Johnnie To, Kurosawa Kiyoshi and Miike Takashi, this year's festival will introduce you to buffalo-busting action flicks from Thailand, cartilage-cracking gangster films from Korea, and the first gore flick ever made in Pakistan!
The New York Asian Film Festival is five years old! Come celebrate by watching the latest and greatest movies from Asia. Movies where people talk about their feelings? No! Movies where people rub the magic nose-hairs of a space amoeba. Movies where all girl punk bands shred the school talent show with power chords. Movies where wall-to-wall mind-blowing action destroys the fabric of space and time right before your very eyes!
The New York Asian Film Festival returns like the Jedi to present its fourth annual event devoted to new feature films from Asia. This year we've watched 180 movies, hand-picked the best 31, filtered them through our unique cold water filtration system from our artesian wells, and let them dry in the warm, New England sun so that when we serve them to you, you will taste their freshness and flavor, as if you had picked these films yourself! These are the most dynamic, highest-grossing, and award-winning movies from China, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Korea, Japan, Thailand and India.
It's here! The New York Asian Film Festival is back to bring you its annual cinematic extravaganza. Featuring the latest and greatest films from Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, China, and Thailand. How do we know? Because we've watched hundreds of movies and chosen the best 20. Our line-up includes Hero from Zhang Yimou (and starring Jet Li and Maggie Cheung), the scariest Japanese horror movie ever made, Juon, the latest movie from arthouse horror genius, Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Doppelgänger, the screamingly great female samurai flick, Azumi, the hugely successful Infernal Affairs from Hong Kong and much much more (including a sidebar of the original blind-samurai-with-a-bad-attitude Zatoichi movies).
New York's BEST contemporary Asian film festival brings 22 of the latest and greatest from Korea, Hong Kong, Japan, India, Thailand and Taiwan to the Anthology Film Archives for 12 days of unrelenting entertainment. Whereas most film festivals show sleepy arthouse snoozers that couldn't get a theatrical release if their lives depended on it, ASIAN FILMS ARE GO!!! brings the blockbusters, the newsmakers, the trend-setters, and the scandalous releases from thousands of miles away, right to New York, just to entertain you.
Hollywood has failed us. Instead of movies they've given us marketing campaigns. Horror movies are boring, action movies are loud and irritating, romances are tired, comedies are stale. Why can't we just see a good movie anymore? Wait! What's that on the horizon? Films from Asian countries flying to our rescue like giant, friendly birds. They have come to bring us peace and love! And water buffalo! And singing terrorists! And giant, rocket-propelled, atomic turtles! Wiggling their booty in Hollywood's face, shaking their tailfeathers and daring you - the hungry, the bored, the oppressed - to catch up with them. These are the blockbusters that Hollywood forgot to make this year. And there's only one place in New York to find them.... ASIAN FILMS ARE GO!!! Someone else can show the art movies, Subway Cinema wants to clear the landing pads for the blockbusters, and here they come. Korean, Thai, Chinese, and Japanese audiences want the same thing from their movies that we do: entertainment. And thousands of them flocked to these movies. Each of these flicks is a propulsive pop masterpiece, designed to seek out your pleasure centers and stimulate them without mercy.
