Leah Sun

✨ We are delighted to present a new short film programme Bodies in Tension as our upcoming December screening. The body has always been central to women/non-binary people’s lived experience - not merely as a biological fact, but as a site where power, desire, memory, and cultural anxieties intersect. As feminist theorist Susan Bordo observes, the female body often becomes “a medium of culture,” inscribed with norms of beauty, discipline, and control. This programme turns to East and Southeast Asian filmmakers who explore the body not only as a site of desire and anxiety, but also as a vessel of identity, history, and cultural inheritance. Their works reflect pressures inscribed at multiple levels: from intimate perceptions of change and longing, to the shaping of women/non-binary’s images in collective memory and dominant culture. Through animation, experimental practice, and fiction, these films open up diverse perspectives on bodily and cultural experience, creating space for expression, resistance, and imagination grounded in lived realities. · Mizuko | Kira Dane, Katelyn Rebelo | 2019 | USA, Japan | 15’ @kira.dane · Here, Hopefully | Hao Zhou | 2023 | USA | 11’ @_haozhou_ · Persona | Moon Sujin | 2022 | South Korea | 7’ @_moonsujin_ · The Bang Straws | Michelle Williams Gamaker | 2021 | UK | 17’ @m.williams.gamaker @luxmovingimage · Lemongrass Girl | Pom Bunsermvicha | 2021 | Thailand | 17’ @pom__bun @squareeyesfilm_ · Re:collections | Yo-Yo Lin | 2021 | USA, Taiwan | 21’ @itsyosquared 18:30-20:00 Sun 7th Dec The Genesis Cinema @genesiscinema 🎫 Book tickets from link in bio Graphic by @xuuuuuu_01

We are delighted to present our second screening, Of Mothers and Longing, a short film programme featuring intimate non-fiction films that move beyond stereotypes to explore the complex tensions between duty and selfhood in East Asian motherhood. In cultures where maternal self-sacrifice and emotional restraint are often idealised, these works centre the agency and emotional depth of mothers navigating egg donation, mental illness, single parenthood, and raising non-binary children. This screening will begin with a live dance performance by Rachel Wang and concludes with an in-person Q&A with director Kaori Oda. • MOM (dance performance) Rachel Wang @rachelwagner814 | 2025 | UK, China | 5’ • Fantastic Eggs and Where to Find Them Vitty Ho @vittyvittyho | 2024 | Taiwan | 30’ • Transparent, I am. Yuri Muraoka | 2020 | Japan | 12’ • Tiger and Ox Seunghee Kim @by.seunghee | 2019 | South Korea | 8’ • Thus A Noise Speaks Kaori Oda @kaori_oda_image | 2010 | Japan | 38’ 15:15 - 17:15 Thu 20 Nov At The Garden Cinema @thegardencinema Book tickets from link in bio Huge thanks to @cici__peng for making Kaori Oda’s in-person Q&A possible, @sine_screen will be presenting the first UK In Focus of Kaori Oda’s filmography from Nov 20th to 23rd, please find more info on their website. Thank you @shuuuuuuuuuuuka for all your support Special thanks to @_monliny_ for helping out as our Q&A translator. Graphic by @xuuuuuu_01

The Knot Collective is proud to present our very first two-part programme, showcasing short and feature films that explore diverse perspectives on solidarity among East and Southeast Asian women. Titled Soft Wounds, Sharp Bonds, this programme delves into the tender, complicated spaces where connection flourishes against all odds, where East and Southeast Asian women find each other across cultural divides, generational gaps, the lingering wounds of patriarchy, and the weight of history itself. These films reveal how the softest wounds cut deepest, and how the sharpest bonds form not in triumph, but in quiet moments of recognition. Through projection and encounter, these women discover a connection that transcends isolation. Each story shows that intimacy requires courage, and that solidarity emerges when someone allows herself to be truly known. 7:30pm - 9:00pm June 20th Short films on ESEA women’s solidarity: · A Tiny Place That is Hard to Touch Shelly Silver | 2019 | United States, Japan | 39 mins @shellyasilver · A Brighter Summer Day For The Lady Avengers (video essay + fiction short) Birdy Wei-Ting Hung | 2024 | Taiwan | 4 + 12 mins @happybird722 · California Dreaming Sreylin Meas | 2019 | Cambodia | 16 mins @anti_archive · Bath House of Whales Mizuki Kiyama | 2019 | Japan | 6 mins @k_ii_yy_a 7:30pm - 9:15pm June 22nd · Knitting Lichuan Yin | 2008 | China | 100mins 📍@_atlas_cinema : LJ Works, 5 Gastineau Yard, SW9 7FA 🪢 The following posts will explore each film in more detail. 🎫 Book tickets from link in bio Graphic design @xuuuuuu_01