Friday, March 28, 2008

Move Over, Mr. Miyagi

 

 Forget about that lesbian Ralph Macchio. What if Matthew Shepard or Lawrence King had known how to defend themselves? Diana Lee Inosanto's new film, "The Sensei," examines that question in a tale of a young man who learns to overcome both homophobic hatred -- and self-hatred.

"The Sensei" will be shown at the 24th L.A. Asian Pacific Film Festival
Sunday, May 4th, at 4 p.m.
Hosted by Visual Communications
For ticket information visit www.vconline.org or call: (213) 680-4462

Go to the film's official MySpace page here.

Synopsis: "The Sensei" is about a lonely gay teen named McClain Evans (Michael O’Laskey) growing up in a small town in Colorado during the dawn of the AIDS epidemic. Constantly the target of hate and bullying, after a near fatal beating by three school mates, he finds himself the secret student of a woman "sensei" named Karen Nakano -- O’Neil (D. Lee Inosanto) who teaches him the martial ways to protect himself and the path to inner peace. But there are some lessons in life that don’t come easy.

CAST: 
Keith David ("Crash," "There’s Something About Mary”) 
Louis Mandylor (“My Big Fat Greek Wedding," "The Quest”) 
D. Lee Inosanto (“The Prodigy) 
Mike Olaskey (“3 Ninjas: High Noon at Mega Mountain”) 
Tzi Ma (“Rush Hour," "Alpha Dog”) 
Sab Shimono (“Southland Tales," "Waterworld”) 
Emily Kuroda (“Gilmore Girls”) 
and introducing Mark McGraw (son of baseball icon Tug McGraw, and brother of Tim McGraw)

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The Sensei is an amazing film. I have had the honor of seeing 3 times in three different cities. Each time, I am blown away by how the Director tackles multiple issues around racism and lack of tolerance without losing the audience due to magnitude of the issue in our society. This is a must see movie!!!!

Trevor Storrs
Anchorage, AK