PURITY DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT
 
"My heart, my soul, my purity." It took that and more to make PURITY, my first feature. It was the hardest thing I've ever done, a true trial by fire.

I've been homeless now for two years. I put my life savings, loans, donations raised from my friends and my parent's friends and a bigger balance than I've ever had in my entire life on my credit cards to make the budget, which scraped together still only came to under fifty thousand dollars which by Hollywood standards is laughable. To tell the truth, I could never have made this movie without the full support of my parents. I've been living in their home in my old bedroom and shooting half the movie there as well!

Finding an all Korean American cast was my original desire, which had to be discarded in order to have the best actors for the job. I searched all of North America and Canada to find my cast. I knew immediately when I saw Susane E. Lee's headshot that this actor looked exactly like the heroine I saw in my mind. She ended up being the only lead actor that was with me from the first round of casting. Each role was filled with at least one, and in the case of Matt Kim, two other actors before I had my final cast. My second Matt Kim pulled out of the project 48 hours before start of principal photography. My response to this disaster was to get on the phone and between myself, my co-Producers, DP and AD, we called about 500 people in the industry to find an Asian American actor who could play 19. It was just crazy fate or maybe an angel dropping a bag of luck on my head that Derek Mio's manager Susan Yoo was a friend of the production and put him on a 6 am flight to audition for me in Delaware. Luckily he was as awesome as he is, or else production would have shut down right there.

I also was determined to have an all-Asian American soundtrack and original score. I went to as many concerts as I could and asked friends and Asian American networks to recommend musicians. It's an awesome time in Asian American music right now, as evidenced by the extraordinary talent in the nine acts that contributed 10 songs.

It was a combination of excellent chemistry, trust in each other and raw talent that makes PURITY work on a relationship level. Not only did that show up on screen, but the cast and crew bonded like we were all at summer camp together. Not having the budget to hire an all-professional crew, I contacted Professor Peter X. Feng from the University of Delaware to offer an internship credit to his class. 16 of his students signed on to work on the production. Two others from my church volunteered and so with my five keys from New York, we had our crew.

Shooting my first feature was the most rewarding experience of my life so far because it is my artistic expression that truly came from nothing. If some young Asian American girl watches my movie and thinks to herself, "If she can do that, I can do whatever I want!" and goes on to take action on it to become the next great voice then I know my work has really changed a life for the better. That's why I do what I do.

Filmmaking is truly the most collaborative artistic expression. Each person who helped the production made it the successful movie it is and I am truly grateful for all their hard work. So onto the show!