People Everywhere Are 'A Lot Like You'

I had the great pleasure of watching an engaging documentary, 'A Lot Like You', over the weekend at the San Francisco Asian American Film Festival. The aspect of the film that resonated most with me personally was the way it approached cultural identity. It touched on so many important cross-cultural issues in the exploration of just one character, including being a mixed-race individual, being an immigrant in America from a vastly different culture, being a first generation American, and exploring your roots in another country and culture vastly different from your own experiences in America. It is so essential for people to keep exploring and talking about these issue in highly visible mediums such as film, and for those works to be exposed to as large an audience as possible. The only way to get rid of prejudice born out of ignorance is for people to connect with people from all different backgrounds and cultures and to begin to see pieces of themselves or people they love in them. Films like 'A Lot Like You' are the future of making cross-cultural exchange and understanding available and relevant to the masses. Now we just have to figure out how to replicate the viral success of Kony 2012 with sensitive works of art like this film, and we will move closer as a global community. Here is an excerpt from my review of the film for our friends at Art With Impact:

[One thing] I will say is that the feeling the viewer has after going on this journey with her, and the connection we feel to not only Eliaichi, but her family in Tanzania, is nothing short of remarkable. Herein lies one of the special powers of film for me personally: the ability to make a culture and a group of people so different from our own so familiar and relatable. The world needs more films like this, and it needs them to be exposed to a wider audience. Because if you can see a person from the other side of the world who lives in such different circumstances with such unfamiliar problems, and you can see yourself in them, then suddenly that distance between you and them becomes nothing. That is what will bring us together as a global community and inspire people to act.

Check out the full review both on Art With Impact's blog, and also over at the filmmaker's blog.