Asian American and Asian-diaspora filmmakers are in the hunt in this year’s Acadamy Awards race. If you thought Chloé Zhao was done winning after Nomadland , think again. The Chinese American director is back with Hamnet , snagging two of the night’s biggest honors: a nomination for best director and another for best adapted screenplay. She’s officially the second woman ever to be nominated for directing twice, and she’s doing it on her own terms, bringing heart-wrenching li

KPop Demon Hunters has been dominating since it dropped on Netflix last June. Still, it’s nice to see it also get some recognition and awards love. The beloved animated movie snagged Best Animated Feature at the 2026 Golden Globes this week, and EJAE, the absolute powerhouse behind the hit "Golden”, took home Best Original Song, accompanied by her songwriting team. EJAE made history as the first Korean-American to take home that trophy. But it was what she said that really m

Documentary filmmaker Christine Choy recently passed away at the age of 73, as reported by The 19th . Her death marks the end of an extraordinary career spent bringing much needed attention to marginalized voices and systemic injustice. While her filmography included over 85 works, Choy is perhaps best remembered for the 1987 documentary, Who Killed Vincent Chin? , which tackled the murder of Chinese American autoworker Vincent Chin and became a landmark work exposing anti-As

Rosemead , the new film starring and produced by Lucy Liu, is a dramatic turn for the actress that’s getting some serious attention for its dialogue about a topic often shrouded in silence: mental health stigma in immigrant families. In the film, set in the Chinese American community of Rosemead in the San Gabriel Valley, Liu portrays Irene, a mother dealing with both her own terminal illness and her teenage son Joe's diagnosis of schizophrenia. Liu opened up about the heart

Barbie actor Simu Liu, known for his starring role in Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings , recently sparked a viral conversation after taking to social media to call out the film industry's systemic prejudices and "appalling" lack of Asian representation. Liu's comments followed a Threads post (below) lamenting the absence of Asian men in romantic comedies. In his powerful statement, Liu wrote: "Put some Asians in literally anything right now. the amount of ba

It’s a familiar story, especially if you’ve spent your life navigating two worlds: the pressure to achieve success in the American system, often by subtly downplaying the parts of yourself that make you different. For years, we’ve heard that message loud and clear. Blend in. Fit in. That’s why listening to director Jon M. Chu talk about his career is so fascinating. The guy who gave us Crazy Rich Asians is now bringing Wicked (with the sequel Wicked: For Good coming out on

The documentary film Third Act is more than a biography retrospective. It's a profound, intimate exploration of art and activism, as well as the complicated beauty of a father-son relationship. Directed by Tadashi Nakamura, the film shines a spotlight on his father, Robert A. Nakamura, a figure who "Generations of artists call… 'the godfather of Asian American media,'" but who his son simply calls "Dad". Initially conceived as a career retrospective, the film evolves into so

Did you, like everybody else on the planet, fall head over heels for KPop Demon Hunters ? Then get ready for some good and not so good (bad) news. The good news is that KPop Demon Hunters 2 is happening! Yay! The bad news? You're gonna have to wait a while. SlashFilm , citing a Bloomberg report, says that the animated sequel is going to be released in 2029. That’s four years after the original’s debut, which means we'll be twiddling thumbs until the end of the decade for the

DreamWorks Animation’s upcoming feature Forgotten Island is shaping up to be something pretty special. The film stands out not only for its story rooted in Philippine mythology but also for who’s telling it. Hollywood has made some progress on Asian representation, but full-length animated features drawn from specific Southeast Asian cultures have been almost nonexistent. As Rolling Stone Philippines noted, it’s “the first international film by a major studio to highlight Fil

Before the fame, before Harold & Kumar and Searching , John Cho was just a college student trying to find his place in the world. In a recent interview about that time in his life, he shares that transferring to UC Berkeley was “the first independent, proactive thing that I did for myself,” a decision that marked a turning point for him. Once there, he suddenly felt a freedom he hadn’t known before. Surrounded by students from all walks of life, he realized he could explore

Disney’s 1942 classic Bambi defined an entire generation, and after years of re-releases on home video, in theatres and on streaming, you probably have no problem picturing its dreamy forest filled with soft pastels, drifting mist, and sunlight melting through trees that look more like a painting than a cartoon. You might be surprised to learn this beautiful, ethereal look came from the vision of one man: Tyrus Wong, a Chinese-born artist whose name appeared in the credits s

Actress and filmmaker Rachel Michiko Whitney is turning her family’s layered, often unspoken history into art with her moving documentary short, Yonsei (a term that means fourth-generation Japanese American). The film has been traveling its way through the festival circuit, and Whitney sat down with Deadline to talk about what it means to honor your past while also working to create something entirely new. What started as an attempt to tell her mother’s story as a Japanese