How We're Gonna Make it Through Till the Morning Sun

"A socially anxious college student reluctantly heads to a party attempting to make new friends. Nande Walters directs “Who Are You Really?”, an experimental portrait of insecurity characterized by a raw, youthful energy. Anya walks into the room and immediately feels like everyone is judging her. Eventually she strikes up a conversation with a young man, but neither really knows what to say and it doesn’t go anywhere. After struggling through the awkward night, she’s surprised to learn that an extroverted friend didn’t fare much better. Walters is only 19 years old, one of the youngest we’ve ever featured on NoBudge, and her film is the work of an artist still learning her craft but she clearly knows the feeling she’s after and captures it with pops of style and a touching closing monologue." -Kentucker Audley

Live From the Clouds immerses the viewer in the intimate memories and imaginations of four women in the director's Japanese-American family, where everyday anxieties of shopping, paying the bills, and flying are ruptured by dreams of financial freedom and homecoming.

Two siblings learn a painful lesson when one secretly pursues the other into the woods in search of an elusive mountain lion.

After uncovering an old video camera, a boy longing for his late father makes chilling discovery.

Taking its title from the Japanese onomatopoeia for bird sound, this is a lyrical, dream-like portrait of the director's grandmother, her fear of flying, and her connection with avian beings.

Through family conversations, home movies, and portraiture, It Smells Like Springtime explores the complexity of Asian-American identity and experience in dialogue with the artist and jeweler Ada Chen and a riotous cadre of kids. Together, they grapple with their ties to their families’ homelands, the paradoxes of representation, and their sense of belonging.