Pacific Arts Movement opened the 15th Annual San Diego Asian Film Festival on Thursday with the action film, “Revenge of the Green Dragons.”
The film festival is now a teenager, executive director Lee Ann Kim joked during the opening remarks before the film screening.
“Revenge of the Green Dragons” is a crime drama set in 1980’s New York. Based on a true story, the film follows two young brothers who are pulled into the world of organized crime in Chinatown. Produced by Martin Scorcese, the film was co-directed by Andrew Lau and Andrew Loo. The film stars — Leonard Wu, Harry Shum Jr. and Eugenia Yuan — and Loo were in attendance and participated in a question-and-answer session after the screening.
“Basing off a true story and finding what I can put into this character, Paul Wong, who is a real person, who actually existed but didn’t have much (written about him) so I had to to develop a lot of it,” Shum said. “Andrew Lau and Loo had specific ideas about the character and I got to put a little bit of my spin on it.”
Also in attendance was San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer. He used the occasion to announce the reforming of the San Diego Film Commission. The commission was disbanded after its funding was cut under the short tenure of Mayor Bob Filner.
“Tonight, as we celebrate the opening night, let’s take a look ahead,” Faulconer said. “We’re going to over 140 films from 21 different countries and close to 20,000 people that’s going to be here for the film festival. That is a huge shot in the arm for this city. That is a huge shot in the arm for arts and culture.”
The San Diego Asian Film Festival continues until Nov. 15 at various locations. For the complete schedule, visit festival.sdaff.org.
For a preview of the films shown at the festival, check out our guide here.
