New York City delivery driver Lu Jia Cheng (Chang Chen) is in big trouble: His wife and young daughter are due to arrive from China, and he’s just been swindled out of the $3000 he needs for their new apartment. It’s a race against time to raise funds, and nothing is going Lu’s way — from thieves and pawnbrokers to the dangers of the road, things just keep getting worse…
Lucky Lu, a story of poverty and moral compromises, recalls the neorealist classic Bicycle Thieves (1948), but this is very much an original vision. Director Lloyd Lee Choi conjures a world full of ethnic and regional specificity, and his use of suspense is laudable — even the film’s quiet moments are shot through with tension. This gripping, deeply humane film inhabits the places many people detour around: the back alleys, hidden gambling spots, and dangerous streets where money is scarce but the stakes are high.
Supported by
Chang Chen, Fala Chen, Carabelle Manna Wei
USA/Canada
2025
In Mandarin and English with English subtitles
At SFU Woodwards
At Fifth Avenue
Book Tickets
Credits & Director
Executive Producer
Forest Whitaker, Kevin M. Lin, Michael Y. Chow, Jason A. Lin, Bing Chen, Maggie Hsu, Nicole Tao, Clara Wu Tsai, Jamie Lin, Daphne Lee, Peng Zhao, Jennifer J. Pritzker, Van Ness Wu, Steve D. Yang, Dajun Yang, Yifan Zhai
Producer
Destin Daniel Cretton, Nina Yang Bongiovi, Asher Goldstein, Tony Yang, Ron Najor, Jeyun Munford
Screenwriter
Lloyd Lee Choi
Cinematography
Norm Li
Editor
Brendan Mills
Production Design
Evaline Wu Huang
Original Music
Charles Humenry
Lloyd Lee Choi
Lloyd Lee Choi is a Korean-Canadian writer and director based in Brooklyn. He has won numerous awards for his screenwriting and short films, in particular his short Closing Dynasty (2023), which won the Crystal Bear for Best Short Film at Berlinale, the Audience Award at SXSW, and the Grand Jury Prize at AFI Fest, among other accreditations. Same Old (2022) premiered in Competition at the 75th Cannes Film Festival, won a Special Jury Mention at TIFF, and was named Best Short at Raindance; it has recently been adapted into Choi’s feature, Lucky Lu (2025).
Filmography: Same Old (2022); Closing Dynasty (2023)
Missing VIFF? Check Out What's Playing at the VIFF Centre
Possible Love
Lee Chang-dong’s first film since Burning (2018) is a sardonic, slow-burning satire about two couples: a documentary filmmaker married to a wealthy businessman, and a working-class family struggling to make ends meet after the husband has been laid off.
Once Upon a Time in Harlem
Once Upon a Time in Harlem splices together footage shot by William Greaves in 1972 of a group of Harlem Renaissance luminaries in conversation at Duke Ellington’s townhouse. The film is a living archive of memory, disagreement, style, and Black genius.
The Secret in Their Eyes
This month's Talking Pictures screening is a multi-layered, poignant thriller interweaving the personal lives of a prosecution investigator (Ricardo Darin) and a judge, with a manhunt spanning twenty-five years. Stay for cookies, coffee and a chat after!
The Haunting
Directed by Robert Wise in 1963, The Haunting is a classic exercise in the suggestive power of cinema, adapted from Shirley Jackson's 1959 best-seller, The Haunting of Hill House, a provocative blend of supernatural and psychological horror.
