Licensed Streaming Videos:
95 and 6 to Go (Access ends January 10, 2025)
In this award-winning documentary, filmmaker Kimi Takesue finds an unlikely collaborator while visiting her resilient Japanese-American grandfather in Hawai'i. A recent widower in his 90s, Grandpa Tom immerses himself in his daily routines until he shows unexpected interest in his granddaughter's stalled romantic screenplay and offers advice both shrewd and surprising. Tom's creative script revisions serve as a vehicle for his memories of love, loss, and perseverance to surface.
The Arch (Access ends September 7, 2024)
When The Arch opened in Paris, it received the most consistently positive reviews of any film to ever play in the "city of light". Set in 17th Century China, this film is considered the first art film in the Chinese language. Deals with the sexual repression of a beautiful widow..."the ludicrousness of mankind, the futility of intelligence."
August at Akiko's
Armed with just his suitcase and a sax, cosmopolitan musician Alex returns home to Hawaii, having been away for nearly a decade. He takes refuge in a Buddhist B&B with a woman named Akiko. Alex's experimental free jazz music at first collides with the sounds of Akiko's meditation, but as the film evolves and a friendship develops, the two harmonize.
The Bad Sleep Well (Access ends February 28, 2025)
Continuing his legendary collaboration with actor Toshiro Mifune, Kurosawa combines elements of Hamlet and American film noir to chilling effect in exposing the corrupt boardrooms of postwar corporate Japan.
In director Akira Kurosawa's scathing THE BAD SLEEP WELL, a young executive hunts down his father's killer.
Call Her Ganda
When Jennifer Laude, a Filipina transwoman, is brutally murdered by a U.S. Marine, three women intimately invested in the case; an activist attorney, a transgender journalist, and Jennifer's mother, galvanize a political uprising, pursuing justice and taking on hardened histories of U.S. imperialism.
Nominated for Best Documentary Feature at the Tribeca Film Festival. Nominated for Outstanding Documentary at the GLAAD Media Awards.
Cemetery of Splendor
Apichatpong Weerasethakul's spiritual tale involves soldiers with a mysterious sleeping sickness are transferred to a temporary clinic in a former school. The memory-filled space becomes a revelatory world for housewife and volunteer Jenjira, as she watches over Itt, a handsome soldier with no family visitors. Jen befriends young medium Keng who uses her psychic powers to help loved ones communicate with the comatose men. Doctors explore ways, including colored light therapy, to ease the mens' troubled dreams. Jen discovers Itt's cryptic notebook of strange writings and blueprint sketches. There may be a connection between the soldiers' enigmatic syndrome and the mythic ancient site that lies beneath the clinic. Magic, healing, romance and dreams are all part of Jen's tender path to a deeper awareness of herself and the world around her.
Daughter of the Nile
Leading Taiwanese New-Wave director Hou Hsiao-Hsien directs this moody and atmospheric drama about the eldest daughter of a broken and troubled family working to keep the family together and look after her younger siblings, who are slipping into a life of crime.
The Farewell (Access ends September 7, 2026)
In this funny, heartfelt story, Billi's (Awkwafina) family returns to China under the guise of a fake wedding to stealthily say goodbye to their beloved matriarch--the only person that doesn't know she only has a few weeks to live.
Golden Globe winner for Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy. Official Selection at the Sundance Film Festival.
First Person Plural (Access ends September 14, 2024)
In 1966, Deann Borshay Liem was adopted by an American family and sent from Korea to her new home in California. There the memory of her birth family was nearly obliterated, until recurring dreams led her to investigate her own past, and she discovered that her Korean mother was very much alive. Bravely uniting her biological and adoptive families, Borshay Liem embarks on a heartfelt journey in this acclaimed film that premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.
Official Selection at the Sundance Film Festival. Nominated for an Emmy for Best Director.
Happy Hour
A powerful affirmation of the immersive potential of cinema. HAPPY HOUR is a slow-burning epic chronicling the emotional journey of four thirty-something women in the misty seaside city of Kobe. As they navigate the unsteady currents of their work, domestic, and romantic lives a sudden, unexpected rift opens between that propels each to a new, richer understanding of life and love.
Filmmaker Ryusuke Hamaguchi's wise, precisely observed, compulsively watchable drama of friendship and midlife awakening runs over five hours, yet the leisurely duration is not an indulgence but a strategy to create a novelistic space for everyday moments to become charged with possibility that yields a subtle emotional intensity rarely possible in a standard-length film.
High and Low (Access ends September 21, 2024)
Toshiro Mifune is unforgettable as Kingo Gondo, a wealthy industrialist whose family becomes the target of a cold-blooded kidnapper in HIGH AND LOW (Tengoku to jigoku), the highly influential domestic drama and police procedural from director Akira Kurosawa.
Adapting Ed McBain's detective novel King's Ransom, Kurosawa moves effortlessly from compelling race-against-time thriller to exacting social commentary, creating a diabolical treatise on contemporary Japanese society.
Ikiru (Access ends March 23, 2027)
Considered by some to be Akira Kurosawa's greatest achievement, IKIRU presents the director at his most compassionate--affirming life through an exploration of a man's death.
Takashi Shimura portrays Kanji Watanabe, an aging bureaucrat with stomach cancer forced to strip the veneer off his existence and find meaning in his final days. Told in two parts, Ikiru offers Watanabe's quest in the present, and then through a series of flashbacks. The result is a multifaceted look at a life through a prism of perspectives, resulting in a full portrait of a man who lacked understanding from others in life.
In Another Country
Legendary French actress Isabelle Huppert stars in the first English-language film from South Korean master Hong Sang-soo, "the love child Antonioni and Hou Hsiao-hsien never had" (Village Voice). In a triptych of overlapping stories, three different French women (a filmmaker, an adulterer and a divorce- Huppert, Huppert and...Huppert) visit a small Korean resort town and encounter a flirtatious director, a lovestruck lifeguard and far too much soju.
Hong's latest tale of love, lust and misunderstanding, IN ANOTHER COUNTRY is an effortless, laugh-out-loud comedy that plays like a lost French New Wave classic.
In the Mood for Love (Access ends March 6, 2025)
Hong Kong, 1962: Chow Mo-wan (Tony Leung Chiu-wai) and Su Li-zhen (Maggie Cheung Man-yuk) move into neighboring apartments on the same day. Their encounters are formal and polite--until a discovery about their spouses creates an intimate bond between them. At once delicately mannered and visually extravagant, Wong Kar-wai's IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE is a masterful evocation of romantic longing and fleeting moments.
With its aching musical soundtrack and exquisitely abstract cinematography by Christopher Doyle and Mark Lee Ping-bin, this film has been a major stylistic influence on the past decade of cinema, and is a milestone in Wong's redoubtable career.
Lucky Grandma
In the heart of Chinatown, New York, an ornery, chain-smoking, newly widowed 80-year-old Grandma (Tsai Chin) is eager to live life as an independent woman, despite the worry of her family. When a local fortune teller (Wai Ching Ho) predicts a most auspicious day in her future, Grandma decides to head to the casino and goes all in, only to land herself on the wrong side of luck...suddenly attracting the attention of some local gangsters. Desperate to protect herself, Grandma employs the services of a bodyguard from a rival gang (Corey Ha) and soon finds herself right in the middle of a Chinatown gang war.
Director Sasie Sealy brings to life a dark comedy about immigrant life, the vulnerabilities of aging and an unexpected friendship. Set in alleyways underground mahjong parlors with a cast of richly drawn characters (including Taiwanese movie star Corey Ha), LUCKY GRANDMA is a love letter to Chinatown and an homage to all the badass elderly women who inhabit it.
Minari (Access ends March 23, 2025)
A tender and sweeping story about what roots us, MINARI follows a Korean-American family that moves to an Arkansas farm in search of their own American Dream. The family home changes completely with the arrival of their sly, foul-mouthed, but incredibly loving grandmother. Amidst the instability and challenges of this new life in the rugged Ozarks, MINARI shows the undeniable resilience of family and what really makes a home.
Moana (Access ends January 31, 2025)
From Walt Disney Animation Studios comes “Moana,” a sweeping, CG-animated feature film about an adventurous teenager who is inspired to leave the safety and security of her island on a daring journey to save her people. Inexplicably drawn to the ocean, Moana (voice of Auliʻi Cravalho) convinces the mighty demigod Maui (voice of Dwayne Johnson) to join her mission, and he reluctantly helps her become a wayfinder like her ancestors who sailed before her. Together, they voyage across the open ocean on an action-packed adventure, encountering enormous monsters and impossible odds, and along the way, Moana fulfills her quest and discovers the one thing she’s always sought: her own identity.
Ms. Purple
In the dark karaoke rooms of Los Angeles's Koreatown, Kasie works as a doumi girl, a young hostess paid to cater to rich businessmen. As she struggles to hide her troubles through soju-and-MDMA-fueled nights, her mind is focused on one thing: earning enough tips to continue providing for her bedridden father. When her father's caretaker unexpectedly quits, Kasie seeks help from her estranged brother, and the siblings are forced to reconnect and reconcile their years long separation. From acclaimed filmmaker Justin Chon.
Mulan (1998) (Access ends December 31, 2024)
A Chinese maiden disguises herself as a man so that she can fight invading Huns. During an ambush, Mulan proves herself to be a brave and fearless leader.
Mulan (2020) (Access ends December 31, 2024)
An epic journey unfolds after Hua Mulan decides to disguise herself as a man to replace her father in the Imperial Chinese Army. As she strives for honor and glory in the battle against the Huns, she must also keep her true identity hidden from her superiors and comrades.
Parasite (Access ends September 18, 2026)
Ki-taek's family of four is close, but fully unemployed, with a bleak future ahead of them. The son Ki-woo is recommended by his friend, a student at a prestigious university, for a well-paid tutoring job, spawning hopes of a regular income. Carrying the expectations of all his family, Ki-woo heads to the Park family home for an interview. Arriving at the house of Mr. Park, the owner of a global IT firm, Ki-woo meets Yeon-kyo, the beautiful young lady of the house. But following this first meeting between the two families, an unstoppable string of mishaps lies in wait.
Rebels of the Neon God
Tsai Ming-liang emerged on the world cinema scene in 1992 with his first, groundbreaking feature, REBELS OF THE NEON GOD. His debut already includes a handful of elements familiar to fans of subsequent work: a deceptively spare style often branded "minimalist"; actor Lee Kang-sheng as the silent and sullen Hsiao-kang; copious amounts of water, whether pouring from the sky or bubbling up from a clogged drain; and enough urban anomie to ensure that even the subtle humor in evidence is tinged with pathos.
The loosely structured plot involves Hsiao-kang, a despondent cram school student, who becomes obsessed with young petty thief Ah-tze, after Ah-tze smashes the rearview mirror of a taxi driven by Hsiao-kang's father. Hsiao-kang stalks Ah-tze and his buddy Ah-ping as they hang out in the film's iconic arcade (featuring a telling poster of James Dean on the wall) and other locales around Taipei, and ultimately takes his revenge.
REBELS OF THE NEON GOD is a remarkably impressive first film that hints at the promise of its director. Though showing such diverse influences as the French New Wave, Wong Kar-wai's early films--and, yes, Rebel Without a Cause--Tsai's film is most remarkable for introducing his startlingly unique vision to world cinema.
Secret Sunshine (Access ends January 31, 2025)
A widow (Jeon Do-yeon) longing for a fresh start in life establishes a piano school in a small town, only to find herself the target of vicious gossip among the locals.
Seeking Asian Female (Access ends September 15, 2024)
Steven is a 60-year-old white American man who works as a cashier in a garage and dreams of marrying a young Asian woman. Debbie, a Chinese American filmmaker, documents his obsessive search for potential brides over the Internet because she hopes to make an expose about his "yellow fever." When Jianhua, or "Sandy," a 30-year-old woman from Anhui, China, agrees to Steven's online proposal and moves to California to be his fiance, unexpected complications arise for all three: bride, groom and filmmaker. From one surprising turn to the next, as the two online pen pals attempt to overcome vast differences in age, language and culture for the sake of a real-life marriage, the filmmaker gets pulled deeper into their story. With comic and poignant twists and turns, this roller coaster relationship documentary becomes a challengingly honest love story for the ages.
Tampopo (Access ends March 23, 2025)
The tale of an eccentric band of culinary ronin who guide the widow of a noodle-shop owner on her quest for the perfect recipe, this rapturous "ramen western" by Japanese director Juzo Itami is an entertaining, genre-bending adventure underpinned by a deft satire of the way social conventions distort the most natural of human urges, our appetites.
Interspersing the efforts of TAMPOPO and friends to make her cafe a success with the erotic exploits of a gastronome gangster and glimpses of food culture both high and low, the sweet, sexy, and surreal TAMPOPO is a lavishly inclusive paean to the sensual joys of nourishment, and one of the most mouthwatering examples of food on film ever made.
Tropical Malady
TROPICAL MALADY is the lyrical and mysterious new film by maverick Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul (Blissfully Yours), one of the most prominent young directors of the Thai New Wave. Tropical Malady chronicles the mystical love affair between a soldier and a young man in the country he seduces, soon to be disrupted by the young man's sudden disappearance. Local legends claim the young man was transformed into a mythic wild beast, and the soldier journeys alone into the heart of the Thai jungle in search of him.
The Wedding Banquet (Access ends December 31, 2024)
A Taiwanese gay man living in Manhattan agrees to a marriage of convenience with a mainland Chinese woman in need of a green card. His parents are thrilled, and fly to the States to help him plan a lavish wedding banquet.
Wet Season
The Oscar entry for Singapore. It's monsoon season in Singapore and the city is pouring with rain. WET SEASON follows the plight of Ling, a Chinese language teacher, whose marriage and school life are fraying apart because she is unable to bear a child. But an unlikely friendship with a student helps her reaffirm her identity as a woman.
Writing with Fire (Access ends March 7, 2025)
In a news landscape dominated by men emerges India's only newspaper run by Dalit women. Armed with smartphones, Chief Reporter Meera and her team break traditions on the frontlines of India's biggest issues, redefining the meaning of power.