Chan-Yang Kim spent the last decade behind a still camera, earning recognition at the National Portrait Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum. Now, the Manchester-raised visual artist is stepping into the director’s chair with Honeydew, a twelve-minute black comedy about two Korean sisters who attempt to rob an Irish pub to pay for their plane tickets home.
The entire story unfolds inside Albert’s, a neighbourhood pub in Withington.
“It’s a pub that inspired me to write this film because the pub itself has a karaoke night on Fridays and Saturdays,” Kim explained.
Subverting Expectations on Screen
Beyond the premise of a heist gone wrong, the project examines homesickness, temptation, and family loyalty within modern Britain. Kim deliberately places Asian women at the centre of an unconventional crime story, giving them agency in a genre that rarely features them.
“For me, it’s important to make films like this because it reverses traditional roles of Asians on screen,” Kim said. “It highlights Asian women, the sisterhood, and it blends a mixture of genres like crime, comedy, and drama.”
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The climax features a high-energy karaoke sequence that Kim models on the electric release found in cinema classics such as Boogie Nights and Saturday Night Fever. A focal point of the production budget involves securing the rights to a vintage track by the 1960s South Korean musical duo The Pearl Sisters, titled “A Cup of Tea” (also known as “Human Comes Before Money”).
Community Support for Independent Cinema
After reaching the final selection rounds of several competitive breakthrough film funds without taking the top prize, Kim chose to bring the production directly to the public. The funds raised will pay the cast and crew fair wages, cover equipment and location costs, and clear the necessary music licensing.
Backers receive access to rewards including invitations to private screenings in both Manchester and London. You can help bring this British-Korean story to life by backing the official campaign.
Support the project directly on Kickstarter
