Sashank Sankar is a filmmaker based in Virginia interested in the inner lives of Asian American immigrants, first generation and beyond, as well as themes of modern loneliness and disconnection. He has worked as part of the production team on Black Enough, a 13 part web series (with season 2 on the way!) and has directed short films, including Adrift, The Boxer, and most recently Reentry.
Where are you from?
I was born in Trichy, India in 1998 and I moved here to America when I was six months old. I’ve spent most of my life in Richmond, Virginia, where I grew up. In terms of film, my parents loved watching movies, and they’ll always show us movies from India so we grew up with that love of film. When I was a teenager, I was a big fan of Christopher Nolan. I remember watching Interstellar in theaters, and I think that was the moment where I was like “Oh, I wanted to be a filmmaker.”
What’s your background in film?
What ended up happening was I went to University of Virginia. My original plan was—well, I was lying to myself—but my original plan was that I was going to be a business major. The first semester was just horrible and I thought this isn’t gonna be for me. So I thought I'd do politics, but I didn’t like the politics class either.
I ended up taking the class Intro to Cinematography by Kevin Everson, who is my favorite professor. Taking that class really solidified it for me. That class was all about practical applications of filmmaking so we were making stuff, watching weird movies that I would’ve never seen, and making films trying to experiment. That space really inspired my love of filmmaking.
It is art, and I thought, “Okay, this is what I wanna do, and this is actually a viable thing.” The biggest thing I learned from Kevin is that art is definitely a career—it isn’t as stable maybe, but there’s thousands and millions of people working as artists and they’re fine.
Did you become involved with filmmaking because of that class in UVA or were you already experimenting prior?
I was making stuff in high school. My friends and I would make films and I got really into writing.But it was always something on the side and taking that class made me realize it didn’t need to be on the side. I was always making weird short films, and having fun. It was always there but I think it just took that class for me to realize, “Okay, I can actually do this for real.”
What have you been working on recently?
I recently put out a movie called Reentry. That was the first thing I made since 2019—it has been a weird year. That was a more experimental film like what we were doing in Kevin’s class: experimenting with footage and juxtaposing things. I’m also currently a production manager on this series called Black Enough which we’re shooting in the summer.
Mostly, I’ve been writing my own scripts. I actually just finished a draft this morning of this feature film that I want to shoot, called An Immigrant Love Story. It’s about this Indian American couple. They get married, they move to America in the span of a month, and they fall in love.
I know that in Asian immigrant communities, a career in the arts tends to be discouraged. Was your family supportive of you switching majors?
It's definitely true that the arts are discouraged. When I was a child, it was interesting to see the way my parents consume art, but they would still talk about some artists offhandedly. I can’t say they’re super enthusiastic about it now, but they’re definitely supportive. I think as they got older too, they began to appreciate the arts more.
They’re trying to support artists, but I don’t think it has anything to do with me. When I was in high school, they were always trying to get singers to visit us and they’re a huge fan of music/movies which they instilled in me.
They always appreciated art even if they weren’t always appreciating artists which is a funny conundrum. They do worry because even though filmmaking is a viable career, it’s just not an easy thing to get into and it’s a very real fear for them and myself. But they’re definitely more supportive than I thought they would be.
Do you feel that as an Asian creator that it’s difficult to break into the industry through traditional channels since there is so little representation?
I think it does. There’s not a lot of representation. We’re seeing some more now like Crazy Rich Asians which was a big deal. I wasn’t a crazy fan of that movie but in terms of representation, it is a big deal. So that was a great thing about it even if I had issues with the representation itself. Having faces like that lead the film was a cultural moment.
This year, Minari was nominated for best picture and best actor, and it’s a Korean American story. But even with those steps, it’s still difficult. Film is not a very welcoming industry, not just for Asian filmmakers but BIPOC filmmakers in general and women of color as well.
The thing I always try to remember is that film is art. Filmmaking is intrinsic and no one can take that away from you. While it’s hard to break into the industry, especially with the stories that I wanna tell which are a lot smaller scale and not as commercially interesting, I think it just takes a lot more work. You have to say my voice matters and this is why it matters. My struggle currently is just seeing if I can do that while maintaining my voice.
It’s definitely harder if you’re Asian, and there was an article recently about this huge producer who was this abusive, manipulative, and racist guy. People like that exist in the industry, but the work matters and something like Minari existing shows people stories like that matter. Part of the reason why I do it is to tell stories that wouldn’t be told by anyone else.
Speaking of movies that have been released this year, 2021’s been surprisingly good for Asian filmmaking with Sound of Metal and Minari. Do you think we’re seeing an increased presence in Hollywood for Asian creators or is it that they’ve been allowed to shine given that the usual big name productions have been halted?
I think we’re seeing an increase. Even going back in history, there was Anna May Wong who was leading major Hollywood productions in the 1930s so Asian Americans always existed in that space. It’s a bit different now compared to before because we're starting to see more Asian Americans have behind-the-scenes power. Steven Yeun was—I don't wanna say he was the only reason—but he was a big part of Minari being made. With him being a major star from The Walking Dead, Okja, and Sorry to Bother You, he has a lot of power. Riz Ahmed from The Sound of Metal as well. He’s a major star and we’re seeing a lot more of that. But, Asian Americans have always existed. We were always making movies.
In the 90s there was this movie called Mississippi Masala starring Denzel Washington. It was about an Indian community in Mississippi and an interaccial relationship between Denzel Washington’s character and this Indian woman played by Sarita Choudhury. There was also The Joy Luck Club. So we’ve always been there but now it's different because now there's some more institutional power Asian Americans have. We still need more but it's better than before.
What was your first exposure to movies that were directed by Asian American folks or had an Asian cast that made you feel adequately represented?
Asia is a whole continent with so many ethnicities and people so there's just so many. When I was a child, I was watching a lot of Indian movies, or Kollywood, which is a subset of the Indian film world. It’s filmed in the regional language Tamil, which is what my family speaks, so I was exposed to a lot of Indian filmmakers through them.
But, the first one that really made a difference in terms of Asian American representation? I honestly think it was watching Mississippi Masala when I was in college. I took a film history class and that film told me a lot because it was a film about an Asian American family made in the 90s. I had always thought they hadn’t made movies like this until the 2000s, so that was a film that made me realize, “This is not a new thing and this has always been around.” If Mira Nair, who directed that film, can tell stories like that then, we can do it now.
For me, growing up in America, it wasn’t really until I got into foreign films did I discover all these amazing Asian filmmakers. I was wondering if there’s any underrated international filmmakers that you would recommend.
I can talk about Wong Kar-Wai but he's really famous so I'm not gonna spend time on that, but he's really amazing. There's a couple of Japanese filmmakers that I love. There’s Mikio Naruse, from the 60s who makes these melodramatic movies and chamber dramas about life in Japan—especially the life of women post-World War II. He’s a really great filmmaker that not a lot of people know about and has a sense of intimacy that a lot of people don’t have.
I can also point to Indian cinema. There's this filmmaker from Tamil cinema called Vetrimaaran. He makes films which are very politically acidic critiques of the system that are simultaneously commercial and accessible. There’s also a real sense of voice and artistic merit put into his work which is a hard balance to pull off. I recommend checking out one of his movies called Visaranai.
I would honestly recommend people to just find what they like. Wong Kar-Wai is a good entry point into Asian cinema. There’s also Hong Kong cinema like the action films Jackie Chan did and John Woo as well. There’s just so much. It’s just about getting started.
I know it’s a bit hard for filmmakers during the pandemic with the lockdown and social distancing. What’s it like shooting Reentry during the lockdown?
Reentry was filmed during the pandemic. A lot of the footage was from last summer—just because I wanted to shoot some stuff, but I didn’t know what I was gonna use it for. Because of the pandemic, I’ve been kind of forced to write. I love writing but if you’re only doing that, I feel stuck like I’m only using one part of my brain.
With Reentry, it was just me. I’ll put the camera down when I saw something interesting and press record. In Reentry, there was a dancing sequence and it was definitely awkward. There were cars driving by and it’s like what’s this kid doing at 9 p.m? That was when I had to put down the camera, move into the shot, and just dance for two minutes and hope it comes out well. It's a weird position to be in because I like to be behind the camera. It was a sudden shift where I’m doing everything by myself which I don’t really like but I enjoyed the experience of making Reentry.
It was definitely a lot of my own feelings about the past year. Consciously, I was thinking a lot about the pandemic. My own thoughts were that I haven't seen anyone in a long time. Also, I think a lot of my work focuses on loneliness and isolation already and that was a theme before the pandemic. Now, I'm definitely looking forward to my next thing and making it in person with other people. I do miss that because the great thing about filmmaking is that it's just so collaborative, and you’re working with other artists.
You also have a podcast on Spotify called Hollywood Hegemony and the episodes have been mostly about these lesser known films. What was the inspiration behind the name and podcast?
I host the podcast with Josh, who is a good friend of mine and we’ve bonded over movies. It was just this thing where he was like “You wanna host this with me?” and I was like “Sure.”
Hollywood Hegemony, I think Josh came up with the name, but it was because we wanted to talk about films outside the mainstream, as pretentious that sounds. We focus on American independent cinema and we also have an episode coming up about Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s movie Three Times, and he’s a great Taiwanese filmmaker. We just try to talk about movies that people may not know about or is super popular. That’s pretty much our inspiration.
You’ve mentioned in the podcast that First Cow was one of your favorite movies that was released during the pandemic. Considering the movie drought we’ve had, do you have any films that came out this year which resonated with you?
Minari’s amazing. I was really impressed by how different it was from the marketing. The way Minari was marketed, it was a movie about the American dream and that was a big talking point. When you watch the movie, it's about the American dream in some ways for sure, but I found it to be a very moving movie about a Korean family in America who’re just trying to do better and make a home for themselves. In a way, it didn’t really have anything to do with the ideals of America. It was about this family trying to be the best version of themselves and have a happy life. I don’t think those values are inherently American; they’re just universally human. It’s also just a really well crafted story. The kid who plays David and his grandma are just so good. It made me cry.
Other than Minari, there’s also a movie called Lover’s Rock which is on Amazon Prime and it was directed by this British filmmaker Steve McQueen who won best picture for 12 Years a Slave. It’s an amazing work, it’s not really a plot movie but it follows this party in a collective space. To go even weirder, there’s a movie called Bloody Nose Empty Pockets about the last day at a Midwestern bar. It’s a documentary and fiction hybrid about people moving in and out of this bar as it’s about to close. Those are my three movies of the year.
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So inspiring! Can't wait to check out the films Sashank mentioned 🤓