Filmmakers analyze roles of race, gender

In the second day of this year’s Virginia Film Festival, students and filmmakers came together in a forum to discuss the back-stories of the big screen.

The Friday forum was hosted in the University of Virginia’s Campbell Hall and focused on the role of race and gender in the films.

“I have always identified myself as an Asian-American filmmaker,” Renee Tajima-Pena told an audience of roughly 100 people.

Tajima-Pena said she realized she wanted to make documentary films in grade school after being derided by a teacher for a presentation she gave about the Japanese internment in the United States during World War II.

“I understood how dangerous the truth was,” Tajima-Pena said.

She said it was also at that moment that she realized she wanted to explore her heritage. She has since done so by co-directing “Who Killed Vincent Chin?,” which was nominated for the 1989 Academy Award for best feature documentary.

Tajima-Pena was joined on stage at Friday’s forum by documentary director Darlene Johnson and director Shih-Ching Tsou, whose debut film “Take Out” is a fictionalized account of the struggles faced by many Chinese people who immigrate to the United States illegally.

Rounding out the forum’s field was Julie Lynn, a UVa graduate and producer whose film credits include “Nine Lives” and “The Jane Austen Book Club.”

A Washington, D.C., native, Lynn said she did not have a great anecdote to share about her rise into the film industry. Instead, she basically indicated she just followed what she thought was interesting and that it landed her in Hollywood.

“It’s a challenge but it’s really fun,” Lynn said.

Her interest seemed piqued when an audience member asked about the role of actresses over 40 years old in movies today.

Lynn acknowledged that women over 40 find it increasingly hard to land the meaty roles they’re looking for in feature films, but said that many find a home working in smaller independent films such as the ones she produces. But because such independent features don’t pay much, audiences are seeing more actresses over 40 taking in-depth roles in the more lucrative medium of television.

For Johnson, who is showcasing her “River of No Return” about an indigenous Australian woman who fulfills a lifelong dream when she’s cast in a film, the story of her work is steeped in her real life.

Johnson, who has an aboriginal heritage, said, “There have been moments where I’ve carried the Aboriginal flag,” but added that ultimately her responsibility is to show both the good and the bad of her subjects.

Johnson was drawn to making documentaries after spending her childhood at the movie theaters, where, she said, the storylines were either out of sync with the person she saw in the mirror or stereotypical portrayals of Aboriginal culture.

“I didn’t really plan to become a filmmaker,” Johnson said. “I think that it chose me.”