$10 General Admission
$30 All Day Pass
9:15 am: KIPUKA - No Charge, OPEN TO The PUBLIC
County: Hawaii
Directed by: Jeremiah Tayao
Year: 2018
T-Shirt Theatre presents "KIPUKA" is an anti-bullying project that addresses bullying, cyberbullying, and teen suicide prevention – written and performed by the students (aged 13-18) at T-Shirt Theatre, a performing company based in Farrington High School. Their stories, which are performed live in front of over 1,200 of their peers in a packed Farrington High School auditorium, are drawn from personal life experiences and are 100% original.
Their 2017-2018 performance of “Kīpuka” takes on a variety of perspectives on bullying like cyber-bullying, self-bullying, being a bystander to bullying, confronting abusive relationships, and even taking the bully's perspective. Kīpuka demonstrates how positive safe spaces and influences like family and community can help counteract the effects of bullying.
Founded by George Kon and the late Walt Dulaney in 1985 at Farrington High School, T-Shirt Theatre has long been a kīpuka itself for many generations of students, deep in the heart of Kalihi, Oʻahu. In the story, rehearsal, and performance process, the students are taught to rehearse for life – acquiring important life skills that they will be able to apply to life beyond the stage.
10:30 am: MAUI'S HOOK - $10 General Admission or All Day Pass
Country: New Zealand
Directed by: Paora Te Oti Takarangi Joseph
Year: 2018
The youth suicide rate in New Zealand is twice that of the United States, and five times that of Britain, while Maori men are almost 50% more likely to commit suicide than non-Maori, making suicide one of the most pressing social issues facing the country today.
Speaking to this crisis directly in one of the most original and stirring films released this year, psychologist and filmmaker Paora Joseph journeys New Zealand’s North Island with families who lost someone close to them to suicide. Seamlessly combining scripted narrative sections with interviews of five brave families mourning the loss of a loved one, Joseph blurs the divide between documentary and drama to make a profound statement about suicide and the people left behind.
MAUI’S HOOK is direct, and purpose-built to start conversations and provoke positive action.
12:15 am: MOANANUIAKEA: ONE WATER, ONE PEOPLE, ONE CANOE -$10 General Admission or All Day Pass
Country: Hawaii
Directed by: Na'alehu Anthony
Year: 2018
In 1976, a voyaging canoe sparked a cultural revival that quickly spread throughout Polynesia, breathing life into ancient myths and legends. More than four decades later, Hōkūleʻa continues to inspire a new generation of navigators and voyagers to gather their courage and sail beyond the horizon of the Pacific. MOANANUIĀKEA: ONE OCEAN. ONE PEOPLE. ONE CANOE. celebrates the historic Worldwide Voyage that connected countless individuals and communities from around the globe. A voyage that also represented the fulfillment of the vision of Nainoa Thompson and his contemporaries, the passing of the mantle to the next generation of kānaka maoli who will retain the skills of their ancestors and perpetuate this tradition for generations to come. It is truly incredible to see the resurgence of a people and their culture, and the decolonization of mind, body and spirit.
3:00 pm: MY HERO'S SHADOW - $10 General Admission or All Day Pass
Country: Hawaii
Directed by: Justin Young
Year: 2018
In 1994, Shane Stant swung the baton that famously took out Nancy Kerrigan in “the whack heard around the world.” Almost 25 years on, the Tonya Harding / Kerrigan saga is still a cultural touchstone, and for the first time the man behind the infamous attack shares his full story. Told through the eyes of his younger sister Maile, who at 26 is finally ready to confront her brother’s violent past, MY HERO’S SHADOW frames Shane’s story through their first conversation on the topic, pitting the hitman the world knew him as against her memory of him as her hero.
Sharing Shane’s life story with never-before-seen access, MY HERO’S SHADOW details his early life from the abuse he received from his father, to the detailed planning and execution of the attack, to the changed man on the other side of prison trying to make amends for his past mistakes. As we follow Maile’s journey to accept her hero’s dark past, we learn that the Hitman, like most of us, is more than his worst act.
Directed by Justin Young from Hawaii and closely tied to the local landscape and people, MY HERO’S SHADOW is an uplifting and redemptive story of forgiveness and change.
4:45 pm: AUGUST AT AKIKOS- $10 General Admission or All Day Pass
Country: Hawaii
Directed by: Christopher Makoto Yogi
Year: 2018
Cosmopolitan musician Alex Zhang Hungtai (of Dirty Beaches) returns to Hawai‘i after many years away. While searching for his missing grandmother, he forms a bond with local elder Akiko, who teaches him to connect with the spirit of home he carries within him.
Interweaving reality and fiction with characters performing a version of themselves, Hawaii-bred director/writer Christopher Yogi invites us along on Alex’s spiritual odyssey towards achieving self-realization and finding inner peace. Exuding the moody cool of a traditional bluesman with the subdued flair of an indie rocker, this city slicker lands in a rural small town on the Big Island on a mission to unearth the fate of his grandparents’ final days and inquire into long-lost extended family. Itinerant in his lifestyle and distant from his roots in his rootlessness, Alex discovers the meaning of home through the wise counsel and friendship of worldly-wise Akiko, who runs a Buddhist bed and breakfast he boards at in his sabbatical from the road. Under her gentle influence, he learns the virtues of slowing down and smelling the flowers.
Placing us intimately in the majestic and lush landscape of paradise with compositions that channel both Antonioni and Apichatpong, Yogi situates and captures this global nomad retracing his origins and discovering untraveled pathways. Returning to one’s home to honor the ancestors, often a perfunctory act, takes on tremendous significance as the living discover how the dead is very much present and always guiding us into the light.
The power of place activates memories of both past and present—whether performing in the local theater, swimming in the lagoon, or working the land in the rural small town. Using minimalist dialogue and amplifying the sounds of nature orchestrated in concert with Alex’s jazz compositions, Yogi ushers us into the primordial presence of earthly delights where there is music in silence and movement in stillness. —Lindy Leong
6:30 pm: STOKE - $10 General Admission or All Day Pass
Country: Hawaii
Directed by: Zoe Eisenberg, Phillips Payson
Year: 2018
Jane is an attorney based in Los Angeles and she’s clinically depressed. While channel flipping, she sees news footage of Kilauea in full force eruption. She buys a one-way ticket to the Big Island, and along the way, she runs into two local guys who sell themselves as tour guides who can take her to see the active volcano. What transpires is a road movie that is an ode to Y TU MAMA TAMBIEN, but with Big Island vibes, fully capturing the unique sub-groups of Hawaii Island from hippie enclaves, spiritual sanctuaries, Native Hawaiians trying to make ends meet, and masked ravers looking for their next hit in the blackness of the lava fields.
STOKE, like Hawaii Island, is a little weird, but also life-affirming, especially for three lost souls who are trying to figure out what their next life moves will be. Sometimes it takes the mana of the land to steer you into the right path.
Click photo above for link to trailer.