David Cho is in that curious threshold between late teens and manhood. He lives in a tight-knit, traditional home in the heart of Koreatown, Los Angeles, with his first-generation parents. David works at the family restaurant, but business is slow and the restaurant is forced to close. His mother, Soyoung, finds another waitressing gig, but his unemployed father, Jin, begins to spiral downward. As the patriarchal balance teeters, tension builds at home. Appeasing his mother, David pretends to go to SAT classes but secretly takes a job at a Korean spa to help his family make ends meet. At the spa, he discovers an underground world of gay sex that scares the hell out of him but also really excites him. As David dares to explore his sexuality, his family life crumbles, forcing him to reconcile his own desires with his parents’ hopes, dreams, and expectations. Joe Seo shines in the role of David, as he grapples with a percolating yet forbidden sexual awakening. With this feature debut, writer/director Andrew Ahn, like his main character, is on the brink of something big. Description courtesy of the Sundance Film Festival. Joe Seo was the winner of the US Dramatic Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Performance.

Lesbian couple Jamie and Jill explore the underground world of S&M while their friends David and Lola compete to see who’s cool enough to go through with a threesome.

Desire Will Set You Free is a feature film that explores life in contemporary Berlin with an often critical and sometimes humorous eye. Based on a true story, the plot follows the relationship of an American writer of Israeli/Palestinian descent and a Russian aspiring artist working as a hustler, offering access to the city’s vibrant queer and underground scenes while examining the differences between expatriate and refugee life. Our characters travel through Berlin’s layered history and unique subcultural landscape; on their adventures they discover influences and remnants of the Weimar Republic, WWII, the Bowie years, and punk.