The Filmmaker
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S. Leo Chiang
Producer/Director, A VILLAGE CALLED VERSAILLES
What keeps him motivated as an independent filmmaker:
My masochistic tendencies?
I want to be proud of my work as a filmmaker, and I believe I can achieve that more readily as an independent. I find being able to share experiences with other independent filmmaker friends can be very helpful and motivating in doing my own work.
His three favorite films:
I have a hard time naming all-time favorites. How about my favorites in the past couple years:
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Julian Schnabel)
Following Sean (Ralph Arlyck)
Rachel Getting Married (Jonathan Demme)
His advice for aspiring filmmakers:
Keep thinking about the audience for the film you want to make — who they are, where they are, what they are interested in, and why. Knowing who you are telling your stories to will make you a better storyteller.
His most inspirational food for making independent film:
Pocky sticks.
Filmmaker Bio
Born and raised in Taiwan, Leo Chiang immigrated to the United States as a teenager and received a MFA in film production from University of Southern California before beginning his filmmaking career. In 1998, the Directors Guild of America commissioned him, then a film student, to direct and edit Directing: How to Get There, for which he documented early careers of several well-known directors including Robert Wise, Norman Jewison, and Steven Spielberg. His other films include To You Sweetheart, Aloha, about the 94-year-old ukulele master Bill Tapia (PBS broadcast 2006, Audience Award at the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival 2005); One + One, a documentary about mixed HIV-status couples (CINE Golden Eagle Award 2002); and Safe Journey, a short fiction film. Chiang is currently working on a documentary about Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao (R-LA), the first Vietnamese American member of the U.S. Congress and a Versailles community member. He also collaborates with other documentarians as an editor (True-Hearted Vixen, Recalling Orange County), and as a cameraman (It’s STILL Elementary, Ask Not). Chiang is an active member of New Day Films, the social-issue documentary distribution co-operative.
the National Endowment for the Arts