In this screening intended for secondary school students (but is suitable for older viewers, too), each of these six films – three documentaries, three narrative shorts – asks questions of perseverance in times of personal or communal strife or displacement. Among the documentaries, Conversations at the Register and In Living Memory take a look at the familial and communal impact of two Southeast Asian American-owned businesses in Southern California. The Waves Now Calm is a personal reflection of the plight of the Boat People, as well as a document of a Malaysian fisherman’s reflections of the former refugee camp on Bidong Island. 

The narrative half of this set features a young Vietnamese American teenager seeking to more fully express herself in Hyphen, despite the linguistic barriers she faces in communicating with her grandmother. A duo of athletic stories feature young protagonists with differing motivations – sporting accomplishment (Match Point) and simple self-confidence (Dawn of Skates). – Eric Nong