Here, Hopefully
2023 · 11m · USA
Directed by Hao Zhou
Genres: documentary, LGBTQ+
Tones: contemplative, tender
Zee, a nonbinary nursing student from rural China, navigates post-graduation life in Iowa City — working to pass their licensure exam for a work visa while carving out a gender-affirming existence.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
Zhou finds the whole American immigration-identity maze and distills it into 11 minutes without a single piece of expository dialogue — Iowa hasn't been this quietly radical since Field of Dreams.
Iowa as queer immigrant sanctuary refuses every coastal assumption about where this story is allowed to take place — that's the real formal move, and the Firelight/CAAM Homegrown support, the Outfest Jury Mention, all of it suggests a film working at the texture of a specific life rather than the abstraction of a representation.
Iowa as the unlikely sanctuary for a nonbinary Chinese nursing student refusing coastal assumptions about queer-immigrant-of-color geography — that's a sharp documentary instinct. Firelight Media/CAAM backing suggests serious documentary craft.
Festivals
- Outfest 2023, Jury Mention