The Healing Magic of ‘Marvelous and the Black Hole’

May 4, 2022May 4, 2022 Elvie Mae Parian

The “face” of the coming-of-age story has been changing: It is not that teenagers have changed — far from it in fact, when the woes of adolescence remain one of the most universal parts of the human experience — but it is apparent in recent years that the default notions of what a “teenager” should look like has changed to be better reflective of what the viewing world needs today.

Movies, Sci Fi

See the Haunting Trailer for Kogonada’s New Film, ‘After Yang’

February 1, 2022February 1, 2022 Keith Chow

After making a splash at the Cannes Film Festival last summer, After Yang is finally being released to mass audiences next month. The film — starring Colin Farrell, Jodie Turner-Smith, Justin H. Min, Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja, and Haley Lu Richardson — is director Kogonada’s follow-up to his critically acclaimed debut, Columbus.

Movies, Recaps, Reviews1 Comment

Sundance Highlights Speculative Storytelling From Southeast Asia

January 31, 2022January 31, 2022 Lauren Lola

The 2022 Sundance Film Festival has come to a close, following 11 days of presenting in-depth films and conversations from all over the world, for an audience that was originally supposed to be a hybrid one. While there was so much in store in terms of new works, a major takeaway yours truly got from attendance is that there are quite a few speculative works arising from Southeast Asia, and Sundance made the world premieres possible for two of them: Ham Tran’s Maika and Martika Ramirez Escobar’s Leonor Will Never Die.

Movies, Podcasts

Southern Fried Asian: Sung Kang

June 25, 2021July 21, 2021 Southern Fried Asian

Justice is coming to Southern Fried Asian! Ahead of the world premiere of F9, the latest installment of The Fast Saga, its fan-favorite star Sung Kang joins the podcast to talk about the film and growing up in Georgia.

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Movies, Reviews, Streaming

NOC Sundance Review: ‘Judas and the Black Messiah’

February 1, 2021August 18, 2021 Valerie Complex

While the details of Judas Iscariot’s betrayal of Jesus Christ are debated, Judas goes down in history as one of the most infamous traitors — all over 30 pieces of silver. Maybe Judas didn’t like the fact that the people hailed Christ as a “Messiah” — a title the FBI used as code names for Black radical liberators in the 1960s to the late 1970s. One such “Messiah” is the young Black Panther activist and Chicago native Fred Hampton, mercilessly killed thanks to Black a panther Party (BPP) infiltrator and informant William O’Neal, FBI Agent Roy Mitchell, and J. Edgar Hoover.

Movies, Reviews, Streaming1 Comment

Give Daniel Kaluuya and LaKeith Stanfield Their Roses for ‘Judas and the Black Messiah’

February 1, 2021May 15, 2021 Jamal Michel

With regard to director Shaka King’s masterpiece, the aforementioned sentiment goes double for Kaluuya’s fellow cast members Dominique Fishback, Ashton Sanders, Algee Smith, Dominique Thorne, and Jesse Plemons. Judas and the Black Messiah follows the life and times, and tragic end, of Fred Hampton (played by Kaluuya), the Black Panther Party Chairman of the Illinois chapter in the late 1960s. Most importantly, the film lays bare the attempts of the FBI to infiltrate and destabilize Hampton’s civil rights campaigns through the aid of petty criminal William O’Neal (LaKeith Stanfield) after applying enough pressure on O’Neal to force him into working as their informant.

Interview, Movies, Television

NOC Exclusive Interview: Actor, Miya Cech, of Nickelodeon’s ‘The Astronauts’

December 31, 2020January 5, 2021 Patrick Strange

I recently had the pleasure of sitting down for a NOC Exclusive interview with Actor, Miya Cech, currently starring as Samantha Sawyer-Wei on the Nickelodeon series, The Astronauts and will have a starring role in the highly-anticipated independent feature film Marvelous and the Black Hole premiering at the Sundance 2021 Film Festival! ENJOY!

Interview, Movies, Streaming

NOC Exclusive Interview: Angel Manuel Soto, Director of ‘Charm City Kings’

October 8, 2020May 15, 2021 Patrick Strange

Heyyyy! It’s Kuya P AKA Patrick Michael Strange and I had the extreme pleasure of speaking with the director of the new film, Charm City Kings, making its debut today on HBO Max, Angel Manuel Soto! Check it out!

Interview, Movies, Streaming

NOC Exclusive Interview: Jahi Di’Allo Winston, Star of ‘Charm City Kings’

October 8, 2020May 15, 2021 Patrick Strange

Heyyyy! It’s Kuya P AKA Patrick Michael Strange and I had the extreme pleasure of speaking with the star of the new film, Charm City Kings, making its debut today on HBO Max, Jahi Di’Allo Winston! Check it out!

Movies, Reviews, Streaming2 Comments

NRW Review: ‘Charm City Kings’

October 6, 2020May 15, 2021 Patrick Strange

The NRW Crew of Glenn Lawrence and Kuya P AKA Patrick Michael Strange got together to do an advance spoiler-free review and discuss the upcoming HBO Max film, Charm City Kings! Tune into HBO Max on October 8 as Charm City Kings rides its way onto your screen!

Stay tuned to the NOC for our interviews with star, Jahi Di’Allo Winston, and director, Angel Manuel Soto!

Hard N.O.C. Life, Movies1 Comment

Hard NOC Life: April Reign is Going to the Oscars

February 22, 2019May 8, 2020 Hard NOC Media

In this bonus episode of Hard NOC Life, Keith talks to the creator of #OscarsSoWhite, April Reign, on the eve of the Academy Awards as she prepares to attend her first ever Oscars ceremony!

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Hard N.O.C. Life, Movies, Television

Hard NOC Life: Desi Geek Miracles

February 14, 2019May 8, 2020 Hard NOC Media

It a Hard NOC crossover as Desi Geek Girls’ co-host (and YA author) Preeti Chhibber joins in on Hard NOC Life to talk about South Asian representation and more!

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Interview, Movies

‘Searching’ Writers Aneesh Chaganty and Sev Ohanian Want to Normalize the Asian American Narrative

August 29, 2018August 29, 2018 Laura Sirikul

Searching has been marked as revolutionary in filmmaking with the story being told through the eyes of the technology and devices we use every day to communicate. The thriller, written by director Aneesh Chaganty and producer Sev Ohanian, tells the story of a missing daughter and a father (John Cho) determined to find her using technology — social media, texts, emails, and various websites.

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Interview, Movies

‘Searching’ for a New Kind of Thriller with John Cho

August 24, 2018August 24, 2018 Laura Sirikul

After a long weekend of interviews, John Cho walked into a room full of Asian and Asian American reporters anxiously waiting to talk to him about his new film Searching, a mystery thriller that not only uses a new medium of filming via the lens of your everyday devices, but is, also, the first of its genre to star an Asian American lead… ever. This movie is important to us and Cho knows it.

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Movies, Reviews18 Comments

Birth of a Nation is Poorly Done Slavery Pain-Porn

October 7, 2016September 8, 2019 Valerie Complex

Nate Parker stars in the Nat Turner biopic film, Birth of a Nation. While most true story adaptations include a few embellishments, don’t go into this expecting anything remotely accurate. After having done some research, very little of what is presented in this film can be found as historical fact. What Parker has created is a sloppy, amateurish, slavery pain-porn film, rife with Christianity overkill. It’s a mockumentary of Nat Turner’s legacy and tries to trick its audience into thinking this is an actual part of history.

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Hard N.O.C. Life, Movies, Sci Fi1 Comment

Talking Advantageous with Jennifer Phang

July 3, 2015August 25, 2015 The Nerds of Color

Last week, one of the most-lauded science fiction films of the year was released digitally, on demand, and in cinemas in New York and the Bay Area. The film, Advantageous, a special jury award-winner at Sundance, tells the story of a single mother and the sacrifices she makes for her daughter in a pre-dystopian, near-future not unlike our own time.

Starring Jacqueline Kim (Star Trek Generations), Jennifer Ehle (Zero Dark Thirty), and Ken Jeong (The Hangover), the film’s writer/director Jennifer Phang recently joined Keith for a special one-on-one edition of Hard NOC Life.

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Crowdfunding, Interview, Music, Nerdcore1 Comment

Please Give this Man Money: Adam WarRock’s Donation Drive

June 11, 2014June 8, 2015 Keith Chow

It’s no secret that we’re big fans of Adam WarRock at the NOC. I mean, just look at the tag cloud at the right of this page. “Adam WarRock” is almost as big as “Batman.” Maybe that should be the title of his next album: Bigger Than Batman.

Anyway, today is the anniversary of the day he decided to quit his day job and be a rapper full-time. He’s marked this occasion every year by doing an annual Donation Drive to fund all of the awesome (and mostly free) music that he puts out on the internet all the time. So if you enjoy free Adam WarRock music, you should make a pledge. And like PBS, you’ll even get some swag just for doing so! (No tote bags, though. Just more music).

In conjunction with the kick-off to another donation drive, Eugene (that’s his not-so-secret identity) and I chatted about all the music he’s released and touring he’s done this past year and what you can expect from him in the next one and beyond. Plus, we talk about House of Cards and X-Men. But just a little.

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