John David Waiheʻe III is an American politician who served as the fourth governor of Hawaii from 1986 to 1994. He was the first American of Native Hawaiian descent to be elected to the office from any state of the United States. After his tenure in the governor's office, Waiheʻe became a nationally prominent attorney and lobbyist.
Patsy Matsu Mink was an American attorney and politician from the U.S. state of Hawaii. She served in the United States House of Representatives for 24 years as a member of the Democratic Party, initially from 1965 to 1977, and again from 1990 until her death in 2002. She was the first woman of color and the first Asian-American woman elected to Congress, and is known for her work on legislation advancing women's rights and education.
The East–West Center (EWC), or the Center for Cultural and Technical Interchange Between East and West, is an education and research organization established by the U.S. Congress in 1960 to strengthen relations and understanding among the peoples and nations of Asia, the Pacific, and the United States as part of Cold War diplomatic efforts.
Patricia Jude Kensit is an English actress and singer. Beginning her career as a child actor, including in the Rod Steiger film Hennessy (1975), Kensit gained attention when she acted in a string of commercials for Birds Eye frozen peas. She went on to appear in films such as The Great Gatsby (1974), Gold (1974), Alfie Darling (1975), The Blue Bird (1976) and Hanover Street (1979). Balancing a dual career as both an actress and a singer, in 1983 Kensit formed and became the lead singer of the pop band Eighth Wonder. The group released several singles, including the top 20 hits "I'm Not Scared" and "Cross My Heart", before disbanding in 1989.
Jake Shimabukuro is a ukulele virtuoso and composer from Hawaii known for his fast and complex finger work. His music combines elements of jazz, blues, funk, rock, bluegrass, classical, folk, and flamenco. Shimabukuro has written numerous original compositions, including the entire soundtracks to two Japanese films, Hula Girls (2007) and Sideways (2009), the Japanese remake of the same name.
The Hawai'i International Film Festival (HIFF) is an annual film festival held in the United States state of Hawaii.
Kayo Hatta was an American filmmaker, writer, and community activist. She directed and co-wrote the independent dramatic feature-length film Picture Bride, which won the Sundance Film Festival Audience Award in 1995 for Best Dramatic Film.
The Network for the Promotion of Asian Cinema (NETPAC) is a worldwide organization of 29 member countries. It was created as the result of a conference on Asian cinema organized by Cinemaya, the Asian Film Quarterly, in New Delhi in 1990 at the instance and with the support of UNESCO, Paris.
Lisa Onodera is an American independent film producer, of such noted films as Picture Bride, The Debut and Americanese. She grew up in Berkeley, California, and attended UCLA where she received a degree from the School of Motion Picture and Television.
Jeannette Paulson Hereniko is an American film producer, television writer, film festival director and film festival founder. She is best known for founding the Hawaii International Film Festival (HIFF), acting as the festival's director from 1981 to 1996 and her active promotion of Asian cinema in America. She is currently the president of AsiaPacificFilms.com, Te Maka Productions Inc. and the Network for the Promotion of Asian Cinema/USA.
God is American is a 2007 French documentary film written, directed and produced by Richard Martin-Jordan.
Gina Kim is a filmmaker and academic. Kim's five feature-length films and short films have garnered acclaim through screenings at most major film festivals and at venues such as the MOMA, Centre Pompidou and the Smithsonian. According to Film Comment, Kim has "a terrific eye, a gift for near-wordless storytelling, a knack for generating a tense gliding rhythm between images and sounds, shots and scenes, and for yielding a quality of radiance in her actors". Between 2004–2007 and 2013–2014, Kim taught film production and theory classes at Harvard University, being the first Asian woman teaching in her department. Kim was also a member of the Jury for the 66th Venice Film Festival and the Asian Pacific Screen Awards in 2009. Currently, Kim is a professor at the UCLA School of Theater, Film, and Television.
The DisOrient Film Festival or the DisOrient Asian and Pacific Islander American Film Festival of Oregon, is a film festival that was started in 2006 and is based in Eugene, Oregon. According to their website and mission statement, the organization is "a grassroots and volunteer-run film festival committed to presenting honest portrayals of the diversity of the Asian and Pacific Islander American experience" and when "selecting new and exciting films for our festival" the W.E.B. Du Bois standard of "for us, by us, or about us" is used to select recent and undistributed works. It was founded in 2006 by Jason Mak.
Pascale Ferran is a French film director and screenwriter. In 2007, her film Lady Chatterley won five César Awards including Best Film, Best Cinematography and Best Adaptation. Her 2014 film Bird People was selected to compete in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. Ferran also wrote the screenplay for The Red Turtle, an animated film by Michael Dudok de Wit, that competed in the Hawaii International Film Festival on 12 November 2016.
Kumu Hina is a 2014 American LGBTQ related documentary film co-produced and co-directed by Dean Hamer and Joe Wilson. It is based on the story of Hina Wong-Kalu, and stars Wong-Kalu, Haemaccelo Kalu and Hoʻonani Kamai. The film premiered at the Hawaii International Film Festival on April 10, 2014, and had its television debut on Independent Lens in May 2015.
Narges Abyar is an Iranian film director, author, and screenwriter, best known for directing Track 143, Breath, and When the Moon Was Full. The film Track 143 is adapted from Abyar's novel titled The Third Eye narrating the story of a woman and her son during the time of war. Her films sensitively picture the sufferings of women and children caused by the society, war or radicalism.
Diane Paragas is a Filipino-American documentary and narrative film and commercial director. She is best known for writing, directing and producing the 2020 film Yellow Rose. Yellow Rose was Paragas' debut narrative feature. The film was selected as the Opening Night Film of the 2019 Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival. Yellow Rose won Grand Jury Prizes at LAAPFF, Bentonville Film Festival, CAAMFEST37, and Urbanworld where it also took the Audience Award. The film also won the Audience Award at the Hawaii International Film Festival.
Kimberlee Bassford is an independent documentary filmmaker from Honolulu, Hawai‘i. In 2005, she founded Making Waves Films LLC, which is a documentary production company. She advocates for gender equity and diversity in films and television. Most of her work focuses on Asian American women and young girls, and her films actively seek to correct underrepresentation of those groups in the media.
Joseph Hall Wilson is an American film director and producer, best known for documentaries and impact campaigns that explore oppression and empowerment among gender and sexual minority communities. He has received an Emmy, GLAAD Media and several film festival awards, and his work has been supported by the Sundance Institute, Ford Foundation, ITVS and Pacific Islanders in Communications.
Robin Lung is a Chinese-American filmmaker and producer based in Hawai'i. Lung is most known for her documentary Finding Kukan, which focuses on the overlooked producer of Kukan, Li Ling A.
