SHORTCOMINGS

By Randall PARK

TOPIC STUDIOS - as PROD

Comedy - Completed 2022

Following Ben, Miko, and Alice as they navigate a range of interpersonal relationships and traverse the country in search of the ideal connection.

Festivals
& Awards

Sundance Film Festival 2023
U.S. Dramatic Competition
    • Year of production
    • 2022
    • Genres
    • Comedy, LGBT
    • Countries
    • USA
    • Languages
    • ENGLISH
    • Duration
    • 92 mn
    • Director(s)
    • Randall PARK
    • Synopsis
    • Ben, a struggling filmmaker, lives in Berkeley, California, with his girlfriend, Miko, who works for a local Asian American film festival. When he’s not managing an arthouse movie theater as his day job, Ben spends his time obsessing over unavailable blond women, watching Criterion Collection DVDs, and eating in diners with his best friend Alice, a queer grad student with a serial dating habit. When Miko moves to New York for an internship, Ben is left to his own devices and begins to explore what he thinks he might want.

      Cleverly and precisely scripted by Adrian Tomine (based on his own acclaimed graphic novel of the same title), the delightful Shortcomings is Randall Park’s assured directorial debut. Exposing a multiplicity of Asian American identities in a fresh and groundbreaking way, the film is poised to challenge audiences with its protagonist Ben — who is cynical and snobbish with a dash of charm — gamely played by Justin H. Min. With wit, humor, and a deep understanding of being an outsider within a marginalized community, Shortcomings embraces the complexity of being human, flaws and all.