Three decades ago, there were no waka hourua (Māori watercraft), no ocean going waka/canoes and no surviving knowledge of celestial navigation in Aotearoa/New Zealand. Oral history and carved artifacts were all that remained of the ancestral Pacific voyagers. Sir Hekenukumai ‘Hek’ Puhipi Busby has helmed this renaissance in Aotearoa/New Zealand. He reached out across the …
In the not-too-distant future, pollution and global warming have left Earth barren, a giant meteorite has crashed down, and an odd-looking vine has started to grow from it. While this vine, nicknamed Pandora, has sucked up the smog and began to purify Earth, it also grows at high speed destroying anything in sight. When the …
The most notorious househusband in history returns! From director Toichiro Ruto, comes the live-action adaptation of the blockbuster anime THE WAY OF THE HOUSEHUSBAND. Yakuza-turned-househusband Tatsu has to take a break from his housework duties to take care of a few things. A suspicious real estate company that moves into the neighborhood association? And an …
Police officer So-eun reluctantly agrees to stand in as the mother of a kidnapped child. When the investigation stalls out, she receives a mysterious phone call. The caller, accusing her of a bad impersonation, demands that she deliver the ransom or her own son will pay the consequences…. Out of options, and unable to inform …
The supernova star power of Hong Kong cinema icons Maggie Cheung, Michelle Yeoh, and Anita Mui propels this gloriously unrestrained action extravaganza from genre maestro Johnnie To, injecting its martial-arts mayhem with a blast of comic-book lunacy. They are the knife-throwing, shotgun-toting, kung-fu-fighting super-heroines who must overcome their dark pasts in order to defeat an …
One of Japan’s most revered tokusatsu series of all time gets a shiny reimagining from creative titans Hideaki Anno (EVANGELION) and Shinji Higuchi (ATTACK ON TITAN) with SHIN ULTRAMAN. With updated special effects and a bigger budget, headlined by Japan’s biggest stars Takumi Saitoh (HIFF 2018 Maverick Award honoree), Masami Nagasawa, and Hidetoshi Nishijima (DRIVE …
When the Korean police decide to transport an assortment of Korea’s most notorious criminals back from the Philippines via cargo ship (a la CON AIR, but on a boat!), the potential for things to go very wrong is palpable. And it is not long before trouble is afoot. The ultraviolent Jong-du (Seo In-guk) has his …
Leonor Reyes was once a major player in the Filipino film industry after creating a string of successful action films, but now her household struggles to pay the bills. When she reads an advertisement looking for screenplays, Leonor begins tinkering with an unfinished script about the quest of young, noble Ronwaldo, forced to avenge his …
SQUID GAME superstar Lee Jung-jae makes his directing debut with this 1980s-set thriller, in which he also plays an intelligence chief who uncovers a plot to assassinate the president of South Korea while hunting for a mole within his own agency. Korean superstar Jung Woo-sung co-stars as a fellow agent also trying to smoke out …
The latest from director Tatsushi Omori (EVERY DAY IS A GOOD DAY), GOODBYE CRUEL WORLD is a star-studded gangster thriller with a Tarantino-esque spin. When a yakuza syndicate’s money laundering operation is robbed in a brazen attack, the Sugiyama Clan leadership are hell bent on making someone pay. How did this seemingly bizarre group of …
With aloha, HIFF acknowledges its occupation of ancestral, traditional and contemporary lands of the Native Hawaiian people, the Kānaka Maoli.
With gratitude, we honor the ʻāina itself and the generations who steward it.