Hello everyone!

My name is Esther Yun Kong, and I am a filmmaker raising money to make a short film!

The Story:

Logline: Desperate to save her family from ruin, a young Korean woman reunites with her estranged relatives to join their yearly hunt of an immortal ancestor, only to learn that the matriarch they despise has been their protector all along.

Emma comes from a small but inseparable family, morally flawed yet bound together by survival: her mother, father, and herself. When her father makes a detrimental mistake and loses their savings on a horse bet, her mother, as always, comes up with a solution.

The solution being... To inherit the family owned land from her long estranged family. BUT the land can only be claimed if Emma manages to catch their immortal great-great-grandmother, who still roams the forests and has eluded capture despite years of searching and hunting.

Determined to save her family, Emma steps into the family tradition and joins the hunt for her elusive ancestor.

When Emma arrives at the family gathering, she slowly begins to understand the true weight of the situation, revealed through blind anger, violence, blood, and fierce competition.

Wooden hunting gears, traditional dances under the moon light, camp fires, missing family members, revenge and blood...this film has it all!

Director's Statement:

A year ago, in 2024, I created an experimental short film that reexamined Korean history through the eyes of Korean women, uncovering the hidden truths, aspirations, and untold stories that have long been overshadowed or erased from historical records.

This new short builds directly on that work. Rather than revisiting the full historical sweep, it focuses on one particular history that formed the emotional core of my previous film: the practice in ancient Korea where husbands mutilated their wives by cutting off their noses, often under baseless accusations of infidelity; even something as small as a change in hairstyle could be weaponized against them.

In the earlier short, I explored how these women might have wished for their daughters to live differently, and I see those wishes as the foundation that allows me to exist today as a Korean woman and to make films about them.

With this new project, I aim to carry those inherited wishes forward, celebrating the lineage of women not through solemnity alone but through a fast-paced, darkly comedic approach that reframes the heaviness of history into something accessible and resonant.

And frankly, I love women. My deepest interests revolve around them, and I have found that the best way to express these interests for me is by making films about them.

Look and Feel:

While the serious themes of matriarchy and family violence might suggest a film that maintains a similarly somber tone in both its cinematography and storytelling, I want the story to remain accessible to a wider audience. Therefore, I aim to incorporate comedic elements into the camera movement and the tone of the dialogue. Examples of such camera techniques include fast zooms, whip pans, and superimpositions.

Fundraising Goals:

Location and travel will make up the largest portion of our budget, including safe transportation of our cast, crew, and equipment to locations throughout the New Jersey forest. Your support will also fund special makeup, additional night-shoot gear, and meals that keep our team working at their best. Finally, your contributions will help cover post-production and festival submission costs, ensuring that the dedication of our cast and crew reaches wider audiences.

Thank you for your time!

Contact:

estheryunkong.com