Independent Lens
Who is Michael Jang?
After decades in obscurity, artist Michael Jang uses graffiti tactics to share his previously unknown body of fine art photography with unsuspecting audiences.
Short Stack 2006 with "My Life ... Disoriented"
Four films — including the two grand prize-winners of the first Independent Lens Online Shorts Festival — explore questions of love, displacement, belonging, and identity. Short Stack 2006 looks at the rise and fall of a boy's first zit, uprooted sisters taking on a new school, revelations about a mourned father, and… Show more
- Series
- Independent Lens
- Premiere Date
- December 26, 2006
- Length
- 60 minutes
Director/Producer
Eric Byler
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The Film
Paris, 1951
Jasmin Gordon’s mother makes a startling discovery 40 years after her father’s death: she finds out that the man who raised her was not her real father. In midlife and without any physical remnants of the past, Jasmin’s mother struggles to reconstruct her identity. This short film is a meditation on the process of reinterpreting personal history and the challenge of recollecting the past in the absence of images and objects.
My Life ... Disoriented
Life gets turned upside down for Kimberlee and Aimee Fung when their father decides to leave his well-paying corporate executive job in San Francisco and move the family to Bakersfield, CA. Moving in with grandparents and helping out with the family business, a massage parlor called “Touch of the Orient,” add to the remodeling of their lives. If the social pressure of starting at a new high school in the middle of the school year weren’t enough, Kimberlee and Aimee are among only a handful of Asian American kids at North High. They soon realize that every choice they make — from where to sit at lunch to what clubs to join — will determine where and if they fit in.
Someday Flowers BloomSomeday Flowers Bloom explores the experiences of Chiyoko Lewis as she faces the challenges of being a Japanese woman transplanted by marriage to Montana. Born in Kagoshima, Japan in the late 1950s, Chiyoko was injured accidentally as an infant by an old Japanese heater system, called a Kotatsu. With a severely injured leg, her life was difficult, but when she meets Jim Lewis in Kumamoto, Japan, where he is performing at a country music concert, both their lives change forever. Even though they can barely speak each other’s language, they communicate with love, overcoming cultural and physical obstacles.
The Zit
Timmy, a young boy preparing for a big school dance, is forced to deal with his first pimple problem — and what a problem it is! Every attempt he makes to rid himself of the ever-growing dilemma only succeeds in making the situation worse. Timmy hatches an ingenious plan to rectify his situation but can’t anticipate the surprising consequences of his actions. Neither will the audience.
