You are currently browsing all entries tagged with 'Sung Kang'

‘Sunset Stories’ Stories: Interviewing the Sung Kang

  • May 10, 2012 9:37 am

I can’t believe I’ve known Sung Kang for over a decade. And neither can I believe that we have worked together multiple times and have not inflicted grievous bodily harm unto each other. I jest, I mean I think we’re both pretty laid back and calm and we must have a lot of common ground after all these years.

I met Sung while working on Better Luck Tomorrow, I remember that after his audition, there was no question in any of our minds, he was Han – little did he know that he would be HAN for over a decade. What I sparked onto with Sung was how his personality is really different from the brooding, silent types that he portrays on screen. In person, he’s really lighthearted, goofy and love to laugh. Our conversations usually centered around how we both loved and hated what we did (acting and filmmaking) and just wanted to somehow capture those moments of what we love the most and make a career out of it – all on our own terms (kind of a pipe dream, I know). Our paths continued to cross over the years and we always discussed working on a project together, but things never really got off the ground. I (co-)wrote Sunset Stories with Sung Kang in mind. I remember him telling me that he wanted to do something different. The character of JP in Sunset Stories is an East LA musician who is on the verge of big life changes. Should he cash in his dreams and start a family and be resigned to be a wedding singer? I knew that both Sung and I had talked about trading in the dream for reality, so I knew even if this character was far from him, he could identify with that central question.  Read more...

‘Sunset Stories’ Stories: Internet Killed the Movie Star

  • May 7, 2012 9:12 am

Here’s the new clip of Sunset Stories with Sung Kang, Michelle Krusiec and Monique Gabriela Curnen.

Less than a week until our West Coast premiere and I’m biting my nails. I’ve been inviting everyone I know to the screening, which seats 600 and having dreams that only my parents show up. They think the film is okay, not their cup of tea. They tell me I should make films with talking animals, they like those. Then, I wake up and look through my contact lists and send reminders on the countless invites I’ve sent.

Once you’re screening on the festival circuit, it seems like a good time to relax and enjoy yourself. Partly, that’s true. I think you definitely have to soak in the fun and give yourself a well-deserved pat on the back, but it’s also the beginning of the second half of the journey that’s just as physically and emotionally draining, even more-so as you put yourself out there to be judged and criticized. Sunset Stories is not my first rodeo. I’ve been in this position a few times before but I’m still just amazed how incredibly unprepared I am and how much harder it seems to get.  Read more...

DADDY FAN – X Rated Family (car) Fun

  • May 2, 2012 2:03 pm

Well, I finally did it.  I got myself a sports car.  After several decades of pining, lusting, and suffering, I finally mustered up the mojo to satisfy my man itch.

Sort of.

OK, I actually didn’t get a sports car.  I put a deposit on one.

I want this. The CAR, not the photoshopped waif.

And come to think of it, the thing’s not even really a sports car either.  It’s more of an SUV meets minivan meets something fast (and furious 6).

What the heck is wrong with me?  After spending my entire post-puberty life torturing my soul with the mantra, “one day I will get myself a sports car…one day…”, when I finally decide to pull the trigger, I don’t even opt for a sports car.  It’s like going to a strip club for your first time and getting a lap dance from the janitor.  Read more...

‘Sunset Stories’ Stories: Writing What You Know

  • April 22, 2012 2:28 pm

So it’s been a few weeks since my last Sunset Stories entry – and I realized I needed to take a much needed break from the film even though it’s “completed” the rush to prepare for the next stage – festivals and hopefully some distribution. It’s been emotionally and physically draining. All I want to do is veg out in front of the television and/or play Mass Effect 3 all day, but really all that amounts to is more guilt and more work.

For this entry I wanted to address a question we got at every Q&A we’ve had so far. Where did the story come from? I know a lot of friends have actually asked the question in many forms. They’re confused about what the film is about – really about. Is it a comedy? Dark? Romantic? The synopsis can only give you so much, so I’m going to try to answer that question as best as I can. It’s an equally easy and hard question to answer. We don’t have a trailer for the film partly because we couldn’t afford to make one (that’s true folks, not kidding) and partly because we couldn’t seem to distill the story and tone of the film into two minutes and some change. We didn’t want to mislead or confuse people and potential distributors and wanted them to discover the film in the theater. Wrong or right, I get a lot of question for clarity so here goes…  Read more...

‘Sunset Stories’ Stories: The End of a Journey

  • March 12, 2012 10:08 pm

So I decided, as a gift to myself, that I would take a relaxing journey to Austin for SUNSET STORIES’ world premiere screening at SXSW 2012. I thought it would be a great way to unwind and reflect on the journey of the film, not to mention take in the beauty of the southwest. Plus, it was a straight shot for the most part through the 10E. Simple. Easy breezy. Until I got stuck on the side of the road for over six hours in the rain…anyway, like any film journey this seemed fated. It was long, hard, grueling, but my goal at the end was worth all of it. After being rescued, I soldiered on to Austin, well in time for the screening that night.

The rest was a BLUR. A bunch of our team and our two leads, Sung Kang and Monique Curnen, made it out for the screening that night at the Alamo Ritz, an amazing theater that served food while you watched the film. That may be annoying for some, but I thought it was comforting and completely reflected the spirit of the festival. If you ever make it there, try the fried pickles! The screening went well – I was told it did. I kept coming in and out of the theater, to check in but couldn’t stand to watch the film with an audience just yet. From the places I did catch, the audience laughed and were engaged. Our Q&A was fun and entertaining. For some reason, Sung Kang managed to talk about his fabulous hair and I had an experience that brought the BETTER LUCK TOMORROW screening from a decade ago back to full circle – but I’ll leave that for another blog entry.  Read more...

‘Sunset Stories’ Stories: Why Micro-Budget Films are so Damn Important & Everyone Should Make One

  • March 8, 2012 3:44 pm

Ernesto’s back to write about his new film SUNSET STORIES, which will have its World Premiere at SXSW on Saturday. The film’s executive produced by our own Justin Lin (with Sung Kang starring) and the first feature to go out under our YOMYOMF Films banner. Ernesto will be sharing his journey with the film on a regular basis. 

From my previous and only entry, I had this grand plan of blogging on the experience of making micro-budget films, going into detail using my first feature SUNSET STORIES as an example and chronicling our long journey up to our premiere – then the realities of micro-budget reared its ugly head and set in.

In a matter of about two weeks we had to finish the picture edit, re-write, re-record and edit in the voice over, prepare titles and title animation, have a new score composed, color correct the picture, edit the music sound, sound mix and finally playback to our screening tape. This doesn’t even mention the publicity and promotions materials and logistics of making the festival screening happen. I won’t bore you with those details. In all, it was a Herculean task, to say the least, especially with what little budget we had left.

Again, we were scrambling, begging, pleading and promising our first born to anyone that would help us. And as of yesterday, everything is finished. It was probably one of the hardest things I’ve experienced in my whole life, and the only thing running in my head, over and over again: I WILL NEVER EVER DO THIS SHIT AGAIN.  Read more...

Around The Horn – Unfulfilled OBSESSIONS

  • February 27, 2012 10:33 am

Do you have an unfulfilled obsession?

I’m curious because usually if you have an obsession (ie. passion, strong interest, mania, addiction, infatuation, fetish, etc.), you’re usually doing it, living it, and/or being it 110%, 24/7.

I’m not sure if it’s rare or common, but I’m curious how many of you have an unfulfilled obsession – something that you just love terribly and think about all the time but have not allowed yourself to fully experience or express.

So what’s your unfulfilled obsession (if you even have one)?  I’m not talking fantasy, btw.  I’m talking about something real and of this earth.  Something that you absolutely love, but for some reason, have intentionally or unintentionally postponed.

I’ll tell you mine – sports cars.

me likes long time  Read more...

Car Tal…I mean “Car Discussion 3″ w/Sung Kang aka Han from “Fast & Furious”

  • February 2, 2012 8:20 am

What’s up good people of the World?  Happy we can share with you all the 3rd installment of Car Tal…I mean Car Discussion (plus the revamp of Car Talk Car Discussion Episode 2 with my good friend Tyrese). We got some flack from Car Talk so we had to change the title from Car Talk to Car Discussion.  The Car Talk from NPR sent lawyers after us saying Car Talk is the title of their show and legally we can’t call our show Car Talk, because Car Talk has been around longer than our Car Talk.  So we needed to change our Car Talk to another name that doesn’t sound like their show Car Talk.  So we decided to change our show from Car Talk to Car Discussion.  Hopefully now Car Talk will not be upset at our Car Talk, I mean Car Discussion.  It’s all very confusing so hopefully Car Talk 3, I mean Car Discussion will clarify everything.

Car Talk Discussion 2 (w/Special Guest Tyrese):

Car Talk Discussion 3:

 Read more...

‘Sunset Stories’ Stories: The Beginning

  • February 1, 2012 1:02 pm

Please welcome Ernesto to our YOMYOMF family. Actually as writer/producer on BETTER LUCK TOMORROW, Ernesto’s been a part of the fam for a long time, but he joins us in an official capacity to blog about his new film SUNSET STORIES, which will have its just-announced World Premiere at SXSW in March and is executive produced by our own Justin Lin (with Sung Kang starring) and the first feature to go out under our YOMYOMF Films banner. Ernesto will be sharing his journey with the film on a regular basis.

It took a lot of convincing for me to write this journal about the making of SUNSET STORIES (formerly COOLER), a micro-budget film shot nearly one and a half years ago. People who know me, know first hand how quiet, insular and private I am, and writing something like this amounts to pulling teeth – with a very, very rusty pair of pliers. Slowly. One at a time. With the molars breaking to pieces and you have to dig them out of blood soaked gumflesh…okay, you get the picture, it’s painful. Well, I finally gave in, so here goes.

With this journal, I’m going to trace the making of SUNSET STORIES and follow our journey to our World Premiere screening at SXSW in March. It’s been a long hard road, with a lot of twists, turns and dead-ends – seriously, as I write this, we’re still scrambling to finish and STILL begging for favors because of our limited budget – but fighting ‘til the end. If you’re reading this, odds are you too are thinking about making a film. I write this for you. Maybe you can avoid the many pitfalls we suffered through or maybe I’ll convince you to go back to grad school for industrial design, trade school for nursing and x-ray tech, or, of course, culinary school. Trust me, I’ve got a drawer full of half finished applications at home. But like many of you, I’m a glutton for punishment and no matter how hard I try to convince myself otherwise, film and writing is where my heart is.  Read more...

Fuck Yeah! Sung Kang!

  • January 31, 2012 5:18 pm

"Fuck Yeah! I'm Sung Kang."

Just wanted to point all our readers to this fan tumblr site that is called, you guessed it, FuckYeah!SungKang. No if’s or but’s, just fuck yeah! and to the point. Run by Admin Hanna, she unfortunately, has not updated it in months, because she’s gotten too busy with real life, like school, jobs, and other questionable activities that are taking her away from her responsibilities of objectifying the one and only Han from Tokyo Drift!

So I am calling you out, Admin Hanna! You have a responsibility to my boy Sung to update your tumblr and get the ball rolling on the Sung-man love. Yes, we are calling you out. We can’t wait until FAST SIX for you to update your tumblr. It needs to be done now. Sung Kang, Fuck yeah!

YOMYOMF at Sundance: The First Time

  • January 24, 2012 7:44 pm

In a few hours, I’ll be boarding a very early flight to Salt Lake City to join some of my fellow Offenders including Justin, Elaine and Anderson for the second half of the 2012 Sundance Film Festival. Unlike the others, this is my first time at the fest. I try to avoid anything that reeks of Hollywood glitziness (which is why I also wasn’t there for the first half of the fest when most of the Paris Hilton types are in attendance), but with a YOMYOMF cabin this year and Anderson’s promise of coke and whores, I couldn’t resist.

And yes, everyone looks exactly the same 10 years later. Vampires or Asians?

And speaking of Sundance and first times, I should point out that Justin’s Better Luck Tomorrow premiered at Sundance exactly ten years ago this year. That was also the first trip to the fest for most of the Offenders—like Sung and Roger–who worked on the film (though not the last, many of the same crew would be back for Finishing the Game).  Read more...

So Sorry–Sung Kang’s ‘Car Talk’ Apology

  • January 19, 2012 9:53 am

Got a letter from the attorney of NPR’s show Car Talk saying that we have to take down “Car Talk Car Discussion with Sung Kang aka Han from Fast & Furious Tokyo Drift” because of legal blah blah blah. So we made this video to apologize (along with the censored edited new version of episode 1). As my mother would say, ME SO SORREEE!

 Read more...