By Emily Ordoñez

People visit museums to view, and perhaps more importantly, to be moved by art. But a new film poses an uncomfortable question.

“What if your favorite Water Lilies were painted by some dude in a garage trying to make a quick buck… if [the paintings] weren’t real, would they still be your favorite?”, FBI art crimes agent played by Kelly Marie Tran unpacks the weight of authenticity in the film "Forge," the Centerpiece Narrative for CAAMFest, the annual festival of films from Asian America and beyond, taking place May 7-10 in San Francisco.

Tran portrays an agent investigating two Chinese American siblings Coco (Andie Ju) and Raymond (Brandon Soo Hoo) Zhang who run a scrappy art forgery ring in Miami. Born into a restaurant family, the brother-sister duo toil away at the modest business, while the art forgery racket provides an outlet for Coco’s creative dreams and Raymond’s financial ambitions.

"Forge" is the first feature-length narrative film from writer-director Jing Ai Ng and one of more than 60 films screening at CAAMFest, produced by the San Francisco-based Center for Asian American Media, returning for its 44th year. This art forgery drama is just one of the films representing the narrative theme in this year’s festival lineup: bad Asians causing good trouble.

“Jing Ai Ng brings a new perspective to the crime thriller with "Forge," mindfully subverting the model minority myth while swirling in the gray area of right and wrong” says CAAMFest Program Manager Dino-Ray Ramos. “This film sidesteps stereotypes and allows its characters to be flawed — sometimes even horribly so. We are seeing more and more AAPI films that are grounded in real-life and combat Hollywood's expectations of Asian Americans representation.”

"About Face: Disrupting Ballet." Nutcracker NYCB.GeorginaPazcoguin: Georgina Pazcoguin performs as
DewDrop Fairy in the New York City Ballet’s production of George Balanchine’s "The Nutcracker."
Image credit: Paul Kolnik for New York City Ballet

Stereotypes Exit Stage
Another film challenging Asian American depictions is "About Face: Disrupting Ballet," a documentary feature spotlighting two Asian American dancers trying to persuade the world’s leading ballet companies to jettison Asian stereotypes, including dancing in yellowface.

Directed by Jennifer Lin and produced by Alameda native Jon Funabiki, About Face chronicles how passionate dancers Georgina Pazcoguin and Phil Chan battle entrenched tradition and political pushback as they shine a critical spotlight on The Nutcracker and other beloved classics in this vivid account of cultural missteps and creative evolution.

About Face is one of 19 CAAM supported documentaries in this year’s festival. “CAAM doesn’t just showcase Asian American stories, we also play an integral role in the pipeline of unique stories that reflect the experiences of our communities,” says CAAM Talent Development and Special Projects Director Sapana Sakya.

Chan, a Berkeley native who previously danced for and currently serves as the resident choreographer for the Oakland Ballet, will be present at CAAMFest for a Q&A panel after the film screening.

Opening Night Gala, 2025. Courtesy CAAM

Night at the Museum
CAAMFest 2026 kicks off on Thursday, May 7 with an Opening Night Gala held at the Asian Art Museum, featuring a variety of bites and beverages from some of the most talked about local food entrepreneurs such as Bake Sum, Hết Sẩy, Mama Lamees, The Sarap Shop, Socola Chocolatier, as well as up-and-coming Asian American craft breweries, including Match Point and Sugoi.

The Gala ticket includes access to all museum exhibits including the newly unveiled "Two Home Countries" by Chiharu Shiota, an artist best known for colorful, large-scale installations. Through installation, sculpture, and video works spanning her career, Shiota’s distinctive visual language evokes the fragility and resilience of history, memory, and personal identity.

Additionally, for one night only, attendees will have the special opportunity to meet artist Risa Iwasaki Culbertson and find inspiration from the museum’s theatrical arts collection. Guests are invited to experience the world of puppetry that spans from Wayang kulit in Indonesia to Tholu bommalata shadow play in India and beyond.

The night of the gala, CAAM will also present a museum-wide scavenger hunt for the chance to win prizes, such as tickets to the Asian Art Museum and a CAAMFest Film Fan Pass, movie tickets, and other limited-edition souvenirs.

Student Auntie in "The Auntie Sewing Squad Resistance" - courtesy CAAM

Resident Resilience
The return of CAAMFest marks CAAM’s rededication to its mission of uplifting Asian American storytelling, during this time when arts and culture organizations are navigating a shifting landscape. “After 2025, a year of historic challenges and change for the media, 2026 is shaping up as a time of renewed vigor for Asian American independent storytellers,” says CAAM Executive Director Donald Young. “The energy of the future is palpable. CAAMFest 2026 in many ways returns us to our roots, with an ethos that is scrappy, inspired, and full of attitude.”

Other festival titles that feature spunky Bay Area stories include "The Auntie Sewing Squad Resistance Playbook," a documentary feature that follows a collective of mostly BIPOC women sewists who worked to protect the community at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Kelvin Han Yee, cameo appearance in "The Only Language She Knows." 1983. Courtesy CAAM

For the first time in over 40 years, a restored and remastered version of Emiko Omori’s "The Only Language She Knows" will be screened free of charge at the San Francisco Public Library; the short, directed by Steven Okazaki, is an intimate portrait of San Francisco’s current (and first Chinese American) Poet Laureate Genny Lim and Chinatown in the early 1980s.

The former Artistic Director for the Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center (APICC) of San Francisco, performer Thao Nguyen. Image courtesy CAAM

Among the five films world premiering at CAAMFest is "The Dao of Thao," a documentary feature that chronicles how—with the help of W. Kamau Bell and others at San Francisco’s Solo Performance Workshop—performer Thao P. Nguyen prepares for her next one-woman show, blending comedy and drama to explore what it means to be a queer, Asian American refugee and mother from an immigrant family — ultimately asking: how do we make and remake ourselves through art?

Visit CAAMFest to see the full list of programs and to purchase tickets online. Ticket prices range from $13 to $80.

Thanks to Our Supporters
CAAMFest 2026 is made possible with support from Champion Sponsors Acura, Asian Art Museum, Bloomberg, and the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in San Francisco. Additional support is provided by Comcast NBCUniversal, AARP, Rakuten Viki, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Kaiser Permanente, Southwest Airlines, Film SF | San Francisco Film Commission, Minami Tamaki LLP, Davis Wright Tremaine LLP, The Maria Elena G. Yuchengco Philippine Studies Program at the University of San Francisco, Asian American Documentary Network (A-Doc), and American Documentary. Special thanks to the following institutional funders and government agencies: Corporation for Public Broadcasting, The Asian American Foundation, San Francisco Grants for the Arts, Ford Foundation, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Doris Duke Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, Henry Luce Foundation, Walter & Elise Haas Fund, Asian Pacific Fund, Color Congress, Campbell Foundation, Robert Joseph Louie Memorial Fund, Jessie Cheng Charitable Foundation, APA Heritage Foundation, and Sheng-Yen Lu Foundation. Thank you also to the following media supporters: BART, Diya TV, iHeartRadio, India Currents, FITNESS SF, KQED, KTSF Channel 26, NBC Bay Area, Nichi Bei News, SF/Arts, SF Station, and SFGovTV.
(Supporters as of April 10, 2026)