After working as a script supervisor on E. J-yong’s Untold Scandal (03), Boo Ji-young debuted with Sisters on the Road (08). Her next film was Following Myselves: The Actress No Makeup Project (12), an experimental omnibus in which actresses were invited to film themselves. Boo broke through with Cart (14), about the hardships faced by the female workers at a large retail store who go on strike, only to be brushed off and eventually brutally suppressed when they stand their ground.

The daughter of Korean parents, Jamie Chung's break came in 2004 when she was working in a sports bar where MTV held auditions for The Real World. She wound up appearing in the San Diego-based 14th season. Chung went on to successfully launch an acting career, making her debut with a small part in Veronica Mars. She has appeared in The Hangover 2 & 3, The Man with the Iron Fist, and Sucker Punch. She received critical acclaim for the indie film Eden, for which she won the Special Jury Award at SXSW.

A musician and an actor, Bryan Greenberg is best known for HBO’s acclaimed series, Unscripted, How to Make It In America, and One Tree Hill. His songs have appeared on Unscripted, Nobel Son, and October Road.

Born in 1984, Han Jun-hee started his film career as a screenwriter on Kim Ho-young’s psychic thriller The Gifted Hands (2013). He quickly joined the ranks of top Korean talent to watch with his directorial debut, Coin Locker Girl (2015), which successfully updates the Korea thriller genre to reflect new realities in Korean society.

Graduating from pink films to the mainstream, Hiroki Ryuichi has built his international reputation with moving, understated films about lonely, alienated women seeking solace in romantic fantasies and transient attachments, such as Tokyo Trash Baby (2000), Vibrator (2003), and Girlfriend: Someone Please Stop the World (2004). In his recent works, including Kabukicho Love Hotel (2014), Hiroki has proved himself as one of contemporary Japanese cinema's most intelligent students of character, as well as one of the most precise analysts of Tokyo's 21st-century zeitgeist and Japan's 21st-century malaise.

One of Hong Kong's Four Heavenly Kings of Cantopop, Aaron Kwok was never supposed to be a great actor. Attending the TVB Training School for Dance in 1984, a few years later he switched to the Acting Program and appeared in television series like TVB's 1987 Genghis Khan. He was just another young guy with a nice face and some dancing skills when a 1990 Taiwanese television commercial for Honda motorcycles he appeared in caught the attention of casting directors, and suddenly Aaron was on fire.

His slick dance moves helped make his first three albums (released in 1990 and 1991) chart-topping hits, and he signed with Warner Music, before winning two back-to-back music awards in 1991: the Jade Solid Gold Top 10 Award and the RTHK Top 10 Gold Songs Award. Over the next 20 years, he won dozens of awards, staged worldwide sold-out concerts, and released numerous albums at a breakneck pace. But, as he says, "There were many layers of packaging… The record company gave you an image to do your job. They're extremely protective. They made you think that your image is very important; it's so firmly linked to your work that the two simply couldn't be separated."

As the 90's passed, Aaron was getting some recognition for his acting, and his strong physicality was attracting attention (in 1991 everyone was surprised when he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the Hong Kong Film Awards for his role as a villain with no lines in Savior of the Soul) but he was desperate to break through to the next level. "From 1990 to 2000 was one stage," he said in an interview. "For the following decade, I hoped to find something in movies that better matches my thoughts, my level of maturity and my work ethic."

He reduced the time he spent promoting his albums, reduced the rate at which he recorded them (getting it down to one a year by 2003), and focused on acting. He had already appeared in some iconic films, co-starring in The Storm Riders (1998), one of Hong Kong's all-time biggest hits, he'd appeared in two films directed by Johnnie To (The Barefooted Kid and Throwdown), and several romances, but it was when he met production designer William Chang on 2005's action movie, Divergence, that he found what he was looking for. Chang is not only an editor and costume designer, but he's inarguably Hong Kong's most influential production designer, collaborating repeatedly with both Wong Kar-wai and Tsui Hark. For Divergence he insisted that Kwok be filmed with no make-up, unshaven, unkempt, and in clothes that didn't fit. It was a revelation for the actor, and he won Best Actor at the Golden Horse Awards for his performance.

The following year, he worked with acclaimed New Wave director Patrick Tam on After This Our Exile, and won another Golden Horse for Best Actor, a back-to-back victory only Jackie Chan had ever previously achieved. In Exile, Kwok fearlessly portrayed a gambling addict, showing a complete lack of vanity and commitment to his craft, and blew audiences away. Aaron Kwok 2.0 was unleashed, and he seemed unstoppable, following up with a series of startling performances in films like Yim Ho's Floating City, the blockbuster Cold War, and his latest tour de force, Port of Call. It's for his constant commitment to excellence that the New York Asian Film Festival gives him our Star Asia Award.

One of Hong Kong's most iconic directors, Ringo Lam trained at television station TVB as an actor before realizing that he was "not as handsome as Chow Yun-fat" and becoming a producer. He went to Toronto's York University where he spent three years studying film, then returned to Hong Kong with a recommendation from his friend, director Tsui Hark, where he joined revolutionary production company, Cinema City. His first movies were all romances and comedies (Esprit D'amour, The Other Side of Gentleman, Cupid One, Aces Go Places IV, and Happy Ghost III) but after Cupid One flopped at the box office he figured his career was over. Instead, one of Cinema City's founders gave him a low budget and told him to shoot whatever he wanted. Fascinated by the robbery of the Time Watch Company, which resulted in a shootout with the police, Lam attended the trial and then made City on Fire (1987). Unsure of how to make an action movie, Lam relied on instinct, and the result was one of Hong Kong's most iconic films.

City on Fire performed well at the box office, and Lam decided to team up with Chow Yun-fat again, this time with Prison on Fire (1987) based on a script co-written with his brother, Nam Yin, who fueled their fire with tales of his underworld buddies. The movie became a massive hit with lines stretching around blocks, and Lam seemed unstoppable. But then came School on Fire (1988), a damning indictment of Hong Kong's school system and social services. The local censors refused to approve it for release unless 30 cuts were made, which Lam reluctantly executed. The hobbled movie was blasted for its pessimistic portrayal of Hong Kong, but is now considered a classic.

Scarred by the experience, Lam started experimenting with his style, making the romantic cop movie Wild Search (1989), which was a riff on Peter Weir's Witness. Then he made Full Contact (1992), teaming up once more with Chow Yun-fat. Fueled by thick licks of hardcore style, the film is, as Lam says, "just crazy enough to work" and it's become another action classic. He also made a successful Prison on Fire sequel, a martial arts movie (Burning Paradise, produced by Tsui Hark), and Maximum Risk (1996) starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. (About working in Hollywood, which he's done on two more Van Damme projects, Lam says, "They always insist on happy endings and stereotyped heroes, which are so uninteresting.")

In 1997, Lam made his last truly important movie, Full Alert, which was, as he says, not just a big action film but also his attempt "to record how Hong Kong looked before the takeover. The narrow alleys, Bird Street, Central, and Causeway Bay… Bird Street has already been demolished. Full Alert is the last film to be shot there." Although it was a box office disappointment, it was nominated for five Hong Kong Film Awards and won Best Film and Best Actor at the Hong Kong Film Critic Society Awards. Lam followed it with a big budget adventure movie (The Suspect), a horror movie (The Victim), and a lighthearted caper flick (Looking for Mr. Perfect). Then, in 2003, he stopped making feature films and, except for directing a sequence of the three-part movie, Triangle (2007), with Tsui Hark and Johnnie To, he hasn't made a movie since. Until now.

Lau Ho-leung was born in Hong Kong and graduated from the Department of Cinema and Television, Hong Kong Baptist University. He majored in Film Directing and has written over 20 screenplays in various genres. His work on Painted Skin (2008) was nominated for Best Screenplay at the Hong Kong Film Awards. Two Thumbs Up is his directorial debut.

Born in 1974, Lee graduated from Boston University with a degree in advertising in 1996. In 1999 he was accepted to the American Film Institute. He also produced and directed several music videos as well as a few short films. From 2002 to 2004 he worked at Bobblehead Factory Productions, directing commercials for the Toyota Sienna, Calvin Klein, and WD-40. Two years after winning over NYAFF audience with his first feature, an anarchic comedy How to Use Guys With Secret Tips (2013), Lee is back in New York with his big-budget period drama The Royal Tailor (2014), set during a clash between tradition and modernity in the royal court of 18th century Korea.

Namewee is a multi-talented film director, singer-songwriter and entertainer from Muar, Malaysia. A YouTube star since 2007, his videos have reached millions and he's become known as the voice of his generation. His debut film, Nasi Lemak 2.0 (selection of NYAFF 2013), became a runaway hit in Malaysia, breaking the local box-office record. He continued to find success in his social-comedy genre with Hantu Gangster (2013) and Kara King (2014). His latest, Banglasia (2014), was banned in Malaysia for being too political, and we're proud to screen it.

Born Tanaka Hiroyuki (1964), Sabu is the cult auteur of “punk n' roll,” alternative comedies, often imitated, but never equaled. Heroes in Sabu's films are often blue and white collar everymen, tossed into dangerously absurd situations from which they desperately try to run. The Japanese filmmaker has drawn comparisons with Buster Keaton, Johnnie To, and Doug Liman, but his satirical jamborees, more than just friendly black comedies, are truly unlike anything else on the silver screen. He continues to push the boundaries of cinema with his new film, Chasuke's Journey (2015), which is the Centerpiece Presentation at this year's NYAFF.

Shim has been the driving force behind Myung Films, which she founded in 1992 as Myung Planning, a film production company that became instrumental in establishing new genres and discovering new talent (Jeon Do-yeon, Song Kang-ho, Choi Min-shik). The company's filmography includes now classic works like Kim Jee-woon's The Quiet Family (1998), Kim Ki-duk's The Isle (2000), and Park Chang-wook's Joint Security Area (2000). Shim continues to balance both commercial and creative success with recent productions including Boo Ji-young's Cart (2014) and Im Kwon-taek's Revivre (2015).

Japanese actor Sometani Shota is the recipient of 2015 Screen International Rising Star Award. This marks the second year of a partnership with Screen International, with whom the NYAFF honors an emerging talent in the East Asian film world. At age 22, Sometani is already a leading man in both blockbusters and indie gems and has earned critical ac- claim on the international film festival circuit. In 2010, he delivered an impressive performance as a compulsive liar in Seta Natsuki’s A Liar and a Broken Girl, a twisted blend of teen romance and bloodshed. In 2011, he received the Marcello Mastroianni Award for Best New Young Actor at the Venice Film Festival for his performance in Sono Sion’s Himizu, along with his co-star Nikaido Fumi (last year’s recipient of the Screen International Rising Star Award). NYAFF audience already know Sometani from the Pacific War epic Eternal Zero (2013). His recent roles are in Hiroki Ryuichi’s ensemble drama Kabukicho Love Hotel (2014) and Sono’s hip-hop musical Tokyo Tribe (2014), both of which will be screened at this year’s NYAFF.

A producer of numerous award-winning short and feature films, Emily Ting has had her films picked up by everyone from the Documentary Channel to Sony Pictures Classics. It's Already Tomorrow in Hong Kong is the first narrative feature film she's directed, written, and produced.

After graduating from Taiwan’s Cheng-chi University, Yee Chih-yen entered the UCLA’s film production program in theater arts. In a ten year period, Yee directed many TV dramas and made his movie debut with Lonely Hearts Club. In 2002, Blue Gate Crossing, his second film, entered Cannes' Director’s Fortnight and the Tokyo International Film Festival, and won the Best Director Award at the Bratislava International Film Festival. His reputation as a high school drama expert is further reinforced by his new film, heist comedy Meeting Dr. Sun (2014), which is showing at this year’s festival.

Born in 1960, Director Yim Soon-rye's short Promenade in the Rain (94), won prizes at the Seoul, Clermont Ferrand, and Fribourg film festivals. Yim's first feature, Three Friends (96) won the award for best Asian film at the first Busan International Film Festival. Her sympathy for those who are marginalized continued to show in The Waikiki Brothers and Forever the Moment (08), based on the true story of the 2004 Korean women's national handball team. Her latest movie, The Whistleblower, is showing at this year's festival.

Yoshida was born in 1963. After graduating from Waseda University, he directed commercials and won numerous awards. In 2007, he directed his first feature film Funuke Show Some Love You Losers!, which screened at the Cannes Film Festival. He won the Japanese Academy Award for Best Film and Best Director for The Kirishima Thing (2012). Yoshida excels in portrayals of female characters, and this year we’re putting a spotlight on his work with the screenings of Funuke Show Some Love You Losers!, Permanent Nobara (2010), and Pale Moon (2014).