Money and Honey
Money and Honey (2015, 101 mins.)
Screening and Discussion
Friday, February 9 at 2:30 pm
Michelson Theater
Department of Cinema Studies
721 Broadway, 6th Floor
Honey, I am away to make money, because ― No Money, No Honey!
“Money and Honey” is a documentary about immigrant workers’ struggle between dreams and reality, spanning 13 years of filming in Taiwan and the Philippines. Living away from their loved ones, both the caregivers and the elderly residents in the nursing home suffer from homesickness. Stories of joy and sorrow take place between them. The Filipino caregivers sing a self-mocking song, "No Money, No Honey!" to comfort themselves. As mothers, these women know how to survive. But the road home seems longer. What price do they have to pay for love and livelihood? Will their dreams ever come true?
Screening followed by a discussion with the director, Jasmine Ching-Hui Lee (Associate Professor, Day-Yeh University) and a preview trailer of Lee's work in progress Come Back My Child.
Presented by the Asian Film and Media Initiative.
Free and open to the public.
Awards
2008 Asian Network of Documentary Fund
2011 Busan International Film Festival, AND Distribution Award
2011 International Taiwan Women’s Film Festival, Audience Choice Award& Opening Film
2011 International Film Festival of Kerala, Social Change Award
2012 Network of Asian Women’s Film Festival, NAWFF Award
2012 Taiwan International Documentary Festival, Audience Choice Award
2012 Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival, Best Documentary and Best Film Editing Nominees
2012 Hong Kong Chinese Film Festival, Silver Award
2012 Mexico International Film Festival, Golden Palm Award
2013 Australian International Labour Film Festival, International Best Film Award
2013 Canada International Film Festival, Excellence Documentary Award
Director Biography
As an independent filmmaker for 20 years, Jasmine LEE conveys a keen awareness of gender, family and migration issues. She is currently an associate professor and Chairman of the Communication Arts at Taiwan's Da-Yeh University.
When Jasmine LEE's grandparents moved into a nursing home, she started exploring stories about Taiwanese elders and their immigrant caregivers. This motivated her to realize "the Homeland and Womanhood Documentary Series" which consists of six works, Where Is My Home? (1999), The Ballads of Grandmothers (2003), City of Memories (2007), My Dear Love (2008), Flying in the Darkness (2011), and Money and Honey (2015).
Jasmine LEE was selected as an outstanding Taiwanese director and was the first Taiwanese recipient of the Asian Network of Documentary Fund in 2008.
Her films have been well received, winning international awards from prestigious film festivals such as the Busan International Film Festival's AND Distribution Award, the Network of Asian Women’s Film Festival’s NAFF Award, International Women’s Film Festival in Seoul’s First Prize, Taiwan Documentary Film Festival’s Audience Choice Award and having been shown during over a hundred film festivals, with more than a thousand screenings.
Jasmine LEE’s most recent documentary, “MONEY AND HONEY”, enjoyed a theatrical release in Taiwan and was selected by fifty international film festivals. In 2015, Taiwan's Ministry of Culture ranked the film as one of the best in the Taiwanese Film Toolbox program. This was subsequently distributed to over 100 countries to promote international art and cultural exchange.