2019 Chinese film So Long, My Son (地久天长) at Carnegie Mellon International Film Festival postponed until fall.

The 2020 Carnegie Mellon International Film Festival and its lone Asian film 2019 Chinese film So Long, My Son (地久天长) will be postponed until the fall amid cancellation of other university events due to COVID-19 concerns.

Free Japanese classes at Carnegie Library in Oakland cancelled for March and April.

via @japangov

The free Japanese classes offered at the Carnegie Library in Oakland have been cancelled for March and April. These include Japanese for Beginners, Japanese II, and Japanese Conversation Club. No reason for the cancellation has been given.

Bong Joon-ho film Parasite (기생충) stays in Pittsburgh through (at least) March 18.

The Oscar-winning 2019 Bong Joon-ho film Parasite (기생충) will keep playing throughout the Pittsburgh region through at least March 12. A synopsis from the movie's official site:

Bong Joon Ho brings his singular mastery home to Korea in this pitch-black modern fairytale.

Meet the Park Family: the picture of aspirational wealth. And the Kim Family, rich in street smarts but not much else. Be it chance or fate, these two houses are brought together and the Kims sense a golden opportunity. Masterminded by college-aged Ki-woo, the Kim children expediently install themselves as tutor and art therapist, to the Parks. Soon, a symbiotic relationship forms between the two families. The Kims provide “indispensable” luxury services while the Parks obliviously bankroll their entire household. When a parasitic interloper threatens the Kims’ newfound comfort, a savage, underhanded battle for dominance breaks out, threatening to destroy the fragile ecosystem between the Kims and the Parks. By turns darkly hilarious and heart-wrenching, PARASITE showcases a modern master at the top of his game.

It will continue locally at the Waterworks Cinema through March 18.

Dumpling Tour of Squirrel Hill, and International Association of Culinary Professionals annual conference, postponed until October.

At Everyday Noodles, by Laura Petrilla for Pittsburgh Magazine.

The Dumpling Tour of Squirrel Hill, originally scheduled for March 27, has been postponed until October along with the conference that is hosting it. From Pittsburgh Magazine:

“At IACP, the health of our speakers, families, and communities is paramount to us. We have been following news reports and updates from the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control closely. As the virulent coronavirus continues to spread, including today in Pennsylvania—like Expo West, the International Housewares Show and the International Food Summit—we have decided today to postpone the International Association of Culinary Professionals annual conference to Tuesday night through Thursday, October 13-15, 2020,” the organization writes in a press release.

[Press release] Fifth Annual Japanese Film Festival at Row House Cinema Tribute to Kenji Mizoguchi, New Anime, Opening & Closing Night Festivities.

Fifth Annual Japanese Film Festival at Row House Cinema
Tribute to Kenji Mizoguchi, New Anime, Opening & Closing Night Festivities

Row House Cinema is excited to announce the dates and films for the 2020 Japanese Film Festival, happening March 20 – April 2 at the Lawrenceville theater.

Entering its fifth year, the festival is a two-week celebration of the wide variety of new films coming out of Japan in addition to timeless classics, cult films, and cutting-edge anime not shown anywhere else in Pittsburgh.

“We anticipate people coming in from Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Buffalo to what has become the largest Japanese Film Festival in the Rust Belt,” said Brian Mendelssohn, owner of Row House Cinema. “This festival is a prime destination for film lovers. Those looking for an exciting lineup and fresh cultural events will not be disappointed.”

The 2020 Opening Night features the Pittsburgh premiere of The Island of Cats – the debut film of animal wildlife photographer Mitsuaki Iwago – and attendees can expect the theater to be transformed into an island of all things “cat.” Each ticket comes with popcorn, Ramune Japanese soda, adorable cat swag, photo opportunities with cat guests, live cats on-site and more!

The Closing Night festivities feature a mashup of Japan’s craziest TV game shows, and then a screening of Rise of the Machine Girls (the insane new offering from the Japanese Exploitation genre) both of which will be accompanied by a variety of beers brought to attendee’s seats. Attendees 21+ Only,

Film lineup, trailers, and tickets can be found on the Japanese Film Festival website www.jffpgh.org

1963 Kurosawa film High and Low (天国と地獄) in Pittsburgh, from March 13.

The 1963 Akira Kurosawa film High and Low (天国と地獄) will play at the Row House Cinema from March 13 to 19, part of the theater's Film Noir series. The Criterion Collection provides a summary:

Toshiro Mifune is unforgettable as Kingo Gondo, a wealthy industrialist whose family becomes the target of a cold-blooded kidnapper in High and Low (Tengoku to jigoku), the highly influential domestic drama and police procedural from director Akira Kurosawa. Adapting Ed McBain's detective novel King's Ransom, Kurosawa moves effortlessly from compelling race-against-time thriller to exacting social commentary, creating a diabolical treatise on contemporary Japanese society.

Tickets are available online. The single-screen theater is located at 4115 Butler Street in Lawrenceville (map).

An-My Lê: On Contested Terrain opens March 14 at Carnegie Museum of Art.

Untitled, Sapa, 1995, via anmyle.com

An exhibition by Vietnamese-American photographer An-My Lê will open March 14 at the Carnegie Museum of Art. A summary of On Contested Terrain:

An-My Lê: On Contested Terrain is the first comprehensive survey of the politically charged work of photographer An-My Lê (American, born Vietnam, 1960). Featuring over 100 photographs, this exhibition presents seven of Lê’s series, providing insight into her evocative images that draw on a landscape tradition to address the complexity of war.

Intimate and timely, this expansive exhibition explores the intricacies of armed combat through the work of a photographer who lived through the Vietnam War. Through Lê’s lens, viewers are exposed to military training, maneuvers, and reenactments, and are invited to question their own relationship to, and complicity in, conflict.

Southside Works Cinema to close.

Southside Works Cinema will close as part of an attempt to revitalize the struggling shopping center. The cinema has long been one of the few places in the city to see new (and classic) Asian films, owing in large part to its distribution deals with places like Funimation Films, Eleven Arts, Fathom Events, and GKIDS. The health of Row House Cinema notwithstanding, between this, the failure of Pittsburgh Filmmakers Theaters, the sudden closure of Silk Screen (due to rampant sexual harassment within the non-profit), and the reorganization of the Hollywood Theater in Dormont, it has been a rough few years for Asian film in Pittsburgh.

Sine Trading International (赛因国际贸易) hiring Chinese Customer Service representative (中文客服).

Manchester-based Sine Trading International (赛因国际贸易) is hiring a Chinese-speaking customer service representative.

Sine Trading International (www.SineTrading.com), a fast growing company providing international logistics, Customs Clearance and domestic shipping to companies nationwide, is expanding fast and in need of a full time customer service who can speak Chinese. The successful applicant will focus on answering customer inquiries by email and instant messenger, and other office work assigned. This is a full time position in Pittsburgh, PA.

2019 Chinese film So Long, My Son (地久天长) at Carnegie Mellon International Film Festival, March 27.

Tickets just went on sale for this year's Carnegie Mellon International Film Festival, which will feature the 2019 Chinese film So Long, My Son (地久天长) on March 27.

In the mid-1980s, two families work together in a factory in northern China. They are very close. So are their sons, who were born on the same day. But then a tragic accident pulls the families apart and, as China’s dramatic social transformation generates increasing inequalities, they follow very different paths both geographically and in economic terms. Will they ever be able to reconcile with one another and their shared but separating pasts? Moving backwards and forwards from the accident through four decades of Chinese history, acclaimed director Wang Xiaoshuai carefully constructs an epic, deeply moving drama of ordinary lives and severed connections in the midst of extraordinary social change.

Tickets for the 7:00 pm show are now available online. It will play at the McConomy Auditorium of Cohon University Center (map).