Ticketing is required for the in-cinema presentation of this title, but tickets are free. Limit 2 tickets. This event will have open seating – sit anywhere in the venue that isn’t specifically reserved.
Canada202599 minEnglish, KoreanDirected By Women, Documentary
In There Are No Words, award-winning filmmaker Min Sook Lee searches for stories of her mother, Song Ji Lee, who died by suicide when Lee was just 12 years old. Through an intimate archive, Lee confronts public, private, and imagined histories in the wake of trauma while negotiating her relationship with her aging father, who met her mother while serving in the Korean Counterintelligence Corps under dictator Park Chung Hee in 1960s Korea. Despite being an unreliable narrator, Lee’s father is her last direct tie to her mother.
Lee turns the camera on herself to trace her experiences from Toronto to her birthplace in South Korea's Hwasun County and back, documenting tender efforts to speak her mother into collective memory. There Are No Words is a brave meditation on grief, loss, memory, and longing, reminding us that even when language fails us, there is still so much to say.
– Jasmine Gui
OFFICIAL SELECTION
Toronto International Film Festival, 2025
Min Sook Lee
Min Sook Lee is an award-winning director with acclaimed documentaries including Migrant Dreams (2016) and The Real Inglorious Bastards (2012). As an associate professor at OCAD University, Lee’s area of research and practice focuses on the intersections of art and social change in labour, border politics, migration, and social justice movements.
13 Nov, 2025 7:30 pm
Innis Town HallAA
Ticketing is required for the in-cinema presentation of this title, but tickets are free. Limit 2 tickets. This event will have open seating – sit anywhere in the venue that isn’t specifically reserved.
CONTENT ADVISORY
suicide, depictions of mental illness, self-harm, trauma, death/dying, discussions of sexual and gendered violence
IN PERSON ACCESSIBILITY
This film is scheduled to be presented fully captioned (all dialogue subtitled + sound cues indicated). This screening will have a Held Space on-site on the third floor. A Held Space is a calm setting hosted by HELD Agency where you can decompress. This space has a designated Active Listener present, who uses a Peer-Based approach to support you through discussing, distracting, and/or de-escalating – whatever you choose and need in the moment. The Active Listener will be available for attendees throughout this event until 10:30pm.
Wheelchair spaces and step-free seating is available for this screening – click below to book accessible seats.
York University’s Korean Office for Research and Education with funds from the Academy of Korean Studies, and the University of Toronto’s Centre for the Study of Korea
Join us for a Q&A immediately after the screening with director Min Sook Lee moderated by Hoa Nguyen.
Hoa Nguyen
Moderator
Hoa Nguyen is a poet and educator teaching writing and poetics at Toronto Metropolitan University. Her books include Red Juice, the Griffin Prize-nominated Violet Energy Ingots, and A Thousand Times You Lose Your Treasure, a finalist for the National Book Award and the General Governor’s Literary Award.
Join us for the closing event of the 29th Reel Asian, "So You Think You Can Pitch" Live Finale. Five emerging filmmaking teams will compete for a prize package to help realize their short films.
15 Nov. 7:00 pm
Through animation’s unique ability to push boundaries and reimagine narratives, this programme reflects the formative dreams that continue to shape Inside Out and Reel Asian. Step into this chaotic but tender journey with us.
6 Nov. 8:30 pm
This panel will explore how racialized and independent creators bring their films to communities and audiences.
11 Nov. 3:00 pm
Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival is a unique showcase of contemporary Asian cinema and work from Asia and the Asian diaspora. Works include films and videos by artists in Canada, the U.S., Asia and all over the world. As Canada’s largest pan-Asian film festival, Reel Asian provides a public forum for Asian media artists and their work, and fuels the growing appreciation for Asian cinema in Canada.
401 Richmond Street West, The Commons (Suite 448)
Toronto, Ontario, M5V 3A8 Canada
(416) 703 – 9333
info@reelasian.com
Charitable number: 870021383RR0001
