Lucky Fish
Two Asian-American teenagers meet in the bathroom of a Chinese restaurant while having dinner with their families.
Interview with Writer/Director Emily May Jampel
Congratulations! Why did you make your film?
I was developing the script during early Covid and was also going through a breakup at the time. I think was feeling this sense of collective heaviness and isolation in the world at the time that a lot of people were experiencing. I really just wanted to create something very sweet and optimistic to put out into the world that could give people a feeling of warmth and connection.
Aside from Alice Wu's Saving Face, which was made in 2004, I had never seen a single American film that featured a romance between two Asian women, so depicting a story that captured this felt really important to me and something I wanted to do for my first film.
In terms of the approach, I had seen a lot of queer coming-of-age films and Asian-American films, but none that felt like they fully captured my own experience, so I wanted to tell my own version of a film in the coming-of-age genre that featured a queer and Asian-American experience that I felt like I could actually relate to, set in a world and with characters that felt familiar to me; the kind of film I would have wanted to see when I was growing up.
Imagine I’m a member of the audience. Why should I watch this film?
I think this film has a really pure kind of sweetness and sincerity that is increasingly rare, especially among independent films that I think viewers will find refreshing. I think there are so many well-made and well-directed films out there that play at great film festivals, but the large majority of them are incredibly dark, depressing and self-serious. I think a film like this offers a bit of levity to help balance some of that out a bit, while hopefully still feeling elevated and artistically strong from a filmmaking standpoint.
How do personal and universal themes work in your film?
I definitely try to be as specific as possible when it comes to creating the details of the world, setting and characters in my films, and through that, create an emotional experience that feels relatable and universal. For this film, I drew from a lot of my personal experiences in creating and fleshing out the world of the Chinese restaurant and the family dynamics in which the story takes place. I drew a lot from real-life conversations and interactions for a lot of the dialogue and characters (that is my actual Gameboy D.S. in the film.) While a lot of this is incredibly specific to my own experience as an Asian-American woman who is half Chinese but who doesn't speak Chinese, I think so many of the larger themes in the story, of feeling like an outsider, of having trouble connecting and feeling like you belong within your community or your own family, feeling awkward around someone you like, or simply struggling to communicate your feelings honestly to another person, are incredibly relatable and universal themes and experiences.
How have the script and film evolved over the course of their development?
The early drafts of the script had the basic foundation of the story's structure, plot and setting, and the process of development was all about creating a lot more depth, nuance and specificity when it came to the world and the characters. I spent a lot of time making the two main characters feel less like formulaic archetypes within the genre (i.e. awkward shy girl and confident cool girl) and more like real lived-in individuals who had full lives and identities outside of just the plot of the story, who we could really believe and care about and become emotionally invested in on a deeper level.
What type of feedback have you received so far?
The feedback has been generally very positive! It seems to have really resonated with younger teenage audiences in a big way, which has been really exciting to see. People really love the lighting and the visuals of the fish tank scene in particular, and there's a lot of really cute fandom between Maggie and Celine's relationship and people wanting to know what happens between them in the future, or saying that they want to see a longer version of the film as a feature or series.
Has the feedback surprised or challenged your point of view?
I think when I was creating this film, I had a fairly rigid and traditional view of what the ideal path or outcome for a short film would be, i.e. submitting it to festivals, premiering at a top-tier festival, then getting it sold to a major streaming platform like Netflix or HBO. But in actually doing the festival circuit and releasing it online and seeing where it's been received the most enthusiastically, all of which were completely unexpected (for example, the film getting millions of views on Tik Tok), I've now sort of learned to just trust the process and believe in the film I am making and trust that the right audience for the film will find it eventually.
What are you looking to achieve by having your film more visible on www.wearemovingstories.com?
I'd love to keep building a wider audience for the film and get it in front of more audiences who can watch and hopefully connect with it. I'm also hoping to build out a larger network with other creatives, producers, and collaborators who I can share connect with and work with in the future.
Who do you need to come on board (producers, sales agents, buyers, distributors, film festival directors, journalists) to amplify this film’s message?
I'd love to have more press coverage on the film, so journalists or publications who are interested in doing interviews with me about the film or my work as a whole, would be great. The film is currently released and publicly available online on platforms like NOWNESS Asia, Vimeo and YouTube but it is also still playing at film festivals around the world, so if any film festival directors are interested in programming the film, that would be great as well. I'm also very interested in doing more educational screenings and talks at colleges and universities as well as speaking engagements for students with the film. The film is already finished but I'm interested in meeting with any producers or other people in the industry generally who connect with my work and might be interested in meeting or collaborating on future projects.
What type of impact and/or reception would you like this film to have?
One hope of mine is that the film can help normalize queer experiences and identities and be an entry point for queer individuals, especially within the Asian-American community, who might be struggling with or figuring out how to have a dialogue with their family members around these topics. But most of all, I just want to make a film that makes people feel nice and less alone.
What’s a key question that will help spark a debate or begin a conversation about this film?
"Which is more important: your obligation to your family or to yourself?"
I think the piece of dialogue that Celine says to Maggie about how she'd rather be selfish than miserable, is a really core theme and question that the film proposes. The challenge hinted at here is the tension between choosing to live your life in a way that pleases other people (in this case, family) at the expense of your own happiness, or living for yourself in spite of how it might disappoint or upset others. There is a negative implication in the latter in how Maggie views it, seeing it as selfish to put herself first and before her family, and a sense of guilt that comes with it that creates her sense of hesitance and uncertainty. However, the way Celine presents this scenario, it seems almost blatantly obvious and inevitable that if given the two options, one would, of course, rather be selfish than miserable. I think a lot of this reflects the thinking of a younger generation and the cultural divide between the parents and children of immigrants that the film depicts, but I think is an interesting point of discussion.
Would you like to add anything else?
I'm really proud of the work my collaborators did on the film, from the performances the two lead actors give to the cinematography, lighting, production and costume design, and even just the incredibly difficult logistics of pulling off a production like this in peak covid with so many restrictions and doing things like building a 6 ft fish tank on the second floor of a Chinese restaurant, that the producers miraculously and gracefully pulled off, that I really hope people will appreciate when they watch this film.
What other projects are the key creatives developing or working on now?
Emily May Jampel (Writer/Director) recently finished her newest short film Mānoa Valley, set in Honolulu, and starring Lukita Maxwell. Lukita Maxwell (Maggie) can be seen as a series regular on the AppleTV+ show Shrinking alongside Jason Segel, Harrison Ford and Jessica Williams. Anna Mikami (Celine) recently acted in her first play Exotic Deadly and is in post-production on a narrative short film she directed. Jeremy Truong (producer) is currently producing a feature documentary about Fire Island.
Interview: May 2023
We Are Moving Stories embraces new voices in drama, documentary, animation, TV, web series, music video, women's films, LGBTQIA+, POC, First Nations, scifi, supernatural, horror, world cinema. If you have just made a film - we'd love to hear from you. Or if you know a filmmaker - can you recommend us? More info: Carmela
Lucky Fish
Two Asian-American teenagers meet in the bathroom of a Chinese restaurant while having dinner with their families.
Length: 8:24
Director: Emily May Jampel
Producer: Jeremy Truong, Yutian Feng
Writer: Emily May Jampel
About the writer, director and producer:
EMILY MAY JAMPEL is a filmmaker from Oʻahu based in New York City. Her short film Lucky Fish has played at festivals including Palm Springs (Winner, Young Cineastes Award, Special Mention, Best LGBTQ+ Short), Champs-Élysées (Winner, Audience Award), Outfest L.A., Frameline, and premiered on NOWNESS Asia. She previously worked as a development executive at the Academy Award-Nominated and Peabody Award-Winning production company The Department of Motion Pictures (Beasts of the Southern Wild, Patti Cake$, Monsters & Men, Philly D.A.).
JEREMY TRUONG is a New York-based producer and co-founder of Rubbertape. He is known for Cicada (BFI London '21, Outfest '20, Frameline '20) which was nominated for an Independent Spririt Award and Bridesman, Grindr's first original series which was nominated for an Emmy award.
YUTIAN FENG is an independent producer born and raised in China. After attending NYU Tisch School of the Arts for Film and TV Production, Tian produced and helped distribute many films and visual art pieces themed around immigration and Asian minority groups. His works have been selected and screened at renowned festivals, such as Palm Springs International Film Festival, International Film Festival Rotterdam, Sydney Film Festival, and New Director/New Films.
Key cast: Lukita Maxwell, Anna Mikami, Zoe Del Giudice, Jenny Lin, Fanny Lawren
Looking for: journalists, film festival directors and producers
Instagram: @emilymayjampel
Website: emilymayjampel.com/Lucky-Fish
Other: Vimeo
Where can I watch it next and in the coming month?
Miluakee Film Festival - Wednesday, May 3 | 7:00 PM | Oriental Theatre: Abele Cinema
Streaming on NOWNESS Asia, Vimeo and YouTube