Lee Isaac Chung

“Any time there is a film in a 'foreign language,' in Spanish or Korean or whatever language, it's usually not an American film. It's usually from another country.”

“'Minari' was only eligible for the best foreign language film category due to the HFPA rules on language, so the film was submitted to meet these rules; there was no choice involved in the matter.”

“There was never a point where I thought, 'I'm going to do something Asian American.'”

“I took time off and realized that what I was lacking was the discipline in trying to write a script.”

“I've never felt completely American.”

“Many filmmakers start off with an autobiographical film from childhood, and that's kind of what I was thinking I would do, but other projects would just present themselves naturally in the beginning.”

“But for me, at one point I was like, 'Why do I want to make films that people want to walk out of?' What if I actually want people to engage and have a good time?”

“I'm not much of a visionary guy when it comes to figuring out how to go about my career.”

“I just feel so damn proud for the entire family behind 'Minari.'”

“I was on this weird, wild goose chase where I thought I might try to adapt a Willa Cather book. And if you don't know Willa Cather, she was an author in the early 1900s. And for a while, she wrote these books about New York high society.”

“I think we just have to be mindful of what that definition of an American dream is. I think we are faced with a lot of definitions of that that are, frankly, unhealthy.”

“When I look back now, as an adult, I'm able to see my mom and grandmother in a different way that I didn't understand as a kid.”

“I was just making movies to make movies. I was so full of anxiety about becoming a filmmaker that I kind of lost the idea of why I was doing it.”

“My grandmother, if she were still alive, she'd be very proud that I held through and did a film in Korean and didn't compromise and then start using that foreign language of English.”

“I had some early success with my first film and since then it's been a grind. It's clearly a craft that I love, and a craft that I work on constantly, but after so many years, I didn't feel like I had much to show for that.”

“I didn't have much of a taste for Korean food growing up: I was over the moon about Mexican food.”

“There's something about just connecting with people in their specific place and also finding that they're human just like me.”

“She died when I was 16 and I just think no history books, nothing is ever going to talk about my grandmother. She was kind of invisible. She couldn't speak English so didn't have many friends. I think of her any time I think of the word 'sacrifice.'”

“My parents, they grew up in a time when there was war in Korea. And my grandmother, her husband, my grandfather, was a soldier and he died in the war. A lot of people in that generation, they didn't go to schools. My grandmother couldn't read; she didn't finish beyond elementary school.”

“I went to Rwanda with my wife who had been going for the past three summers. She is an art therapist who works with survivors of the genocide. I decided to become a volunteer also, and to teach filmmaking. But thinking about how to approach a class, it made sense to start making a movie there, with the kids.”