AGFA August: Terminal USA
August 5, 2024
Moritsugu’s Asian freak-out magnum opus shocked America when it was broadcast on television in the mid-90’s. The director himself plays twins (a drug-dealing bad-ass and a closeted math nerd) in a radically dysfunctional family that completely obliterates the noble myth of the “model minority.”
Introduced by AGFA Executive Director Jackson Cooper.
Holly (Jenny Woo), Marvin (writer/director Jon Moritsugu), and Katzumi (Moritsugu again) are average Asian-American teenage siblings with not-so-average predilections for backstabbing, kinky sex, and drug-fueled freakouts. Neglected by their parents, the kids turn to outside “help” (including the scene-stealing Amy Davis, Moritsugu’s wife and longtime collaborator) in order to escape their bored existence. Naturally, this leads to gore killings, sex tapes, and the most hilarious phone conversations ever captured on 16mm film. A candy-colored hellscape that feels like an episode of Strangers with Candy that was filmed by Dario Argento during a three-day acid bender, Jon Moritsugu's Terminal USA is a crucial piece of 1990s alternative cinema—smart, shocking, and one of the most deranged films to ever be funded by American taxpayers. This is the film Heathers wished it could be.
- Director: Jon Mortisugu
- Principal Cast: Ken Narasaki, Sharon Omi, Amy Davis, Jenny Woo, Victor of Aquitaine
- Country: USA
- Year: 1993
- Running Time: 60 min.
- Producer: Andrea Sperling
- Screenplay: Jon Mortisugu
- Cinematographers: Todd Verow
- Editors: Gary Weimberg
- Music: Brian Burman Michelle Handelman Sugarshock
- Filmography: My Degeneration (1990), Pig Death Machine (2013)
- Language: English