A Movie About Falling in Love with a Qing Dynasty God is Showing at Tribeca Film Festival this Week

Ever fallen in love, in love with someone you shouldn’t have fallen in love with? An unusual love story is at the heart of a new short film from Chinese American director Andrew Thomas Huang. Entitled Kiss of the Rabbit God, the movie is “about a Chinese restaurant worker who falls in love with an 18th century Qing dynasty god”, and is showing as part of the Tribeca Film Festival’s N.O.W. selection in New York on April 25 and 30.

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The god in question is 兔儿神 (Tu er Shen), “a Chinese deity who manages the love and sex between homosexual people”, according to Wikipedia. That entry goes on to note that, “In 2006, Lu Wei-ming founded a temple for Tu’er Shen in Yonghe District in the New Taipei City in Taiwan. Roughly 9,000 gay pilgrims visit the temple each year praying to find a suitable partner. The Wei-ming temple also performs a love ceremony for gay couples at the world’s only religious shrine for homosexuals.”

Anyway, here’s a trailer for the film, which looks fantastic:

And here are the details for the screenings — catch them if you can.

If you’re not already familiar with Huang’s work, you might want to start following the filmmaker and visual artist right now. Huang recently worked as creative director for the Björk Digital exhibition, which presented 360 degree VR accompaniments to the Icelandic artist’s Vulnicura album, and directed this beautiful new video from FKA Twigs, which just dropped:

For more on Chinese animal gods making it into American popular culture, check out our guide to the fox spirit who featured in Netflix’s recent Love, Death + Robots series. And for a deep dive into the world of Chinese ghosts and ghouls, go here: