Gold List Citations Include ‘Minari’ and ‘Sound of Metal’

An often underserved community is getting a big boost in recognition this year thanks to the recent launch of Gold List, who have revealed their selections of this year’s honorees. Created to reward achievements by Asians and Pacific Islanders from the year in film, Gold List is a collaboration between the Gold House led movement Gold Open and CAPE (Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment) to give greater visibility to this community, thereby hoping to increase their inclusion in mainstream media. 

Speaking on the desire to facilitate a larger platform for these API voices in film, Gold House President and Co-Founder Bing Chen said, “We know we have transformative stories; we know our films open to historic numbers — but can we win? Films that are not dominantly English-dialogued are relegated to ‘foreign’ categories, irrespective of their stories, where they’re filmed, and their talents’ origins. However, over 74% of the nation’s two fastest-growing populaces—the Latinx and Asian communities—speak a language other than English at home. Gold List seeks to modernize the industry’s embrace of today’s audiences by mitigating the discrepancy between APIs’ creative and commercial excellence versus their dearth of critical honors. By ensuring filmmakers and talent receive due recognition, the increased awareness allows for more inclusive content which benefits all multicultural audiences”. 

Recent years have seen great success for API representing films like Crazy Rich Asians, The Farewell, and of course Parasite, which went on to break new ground by being the first ever non-English language film to win Best Picture at the Academy Awards. 

Bias against API films remains, however, as represented by the controversial decision by the Golden Globes to place this year’s Minari in their Foreign Language Film category, thereby making it ineligible to compete in the Best Motion Picture – Drama category with the English language films. It was a similar controversy that befell The Farewell last year, a movie that ended up receiving 0 Academy Award nominations despite great critical and audience success. Perhaps with more visibility on the awards circuit, The Farewell could have gotten the recognition that many felt it deserved. 

The Gold List is an effort to break down some of these cultural barriers that are keeping API films out of conversations that other films are welcomed into with open arms. 

The full list of this year’s Gold List selections are below: 

BEST PICTURE

Minari and Sound of Metal

Honorable Mentions: The Half of It, The White Tiger, Yellow Rose 

BEST DIRECTOR

Lee Isaac Chung (Minari) and Chloé Zhao (Nomadland)

Honorable Mentions: Ramin Bahrani (The White Tiger), Diane Paragas (Yellow Rose), Alice Wu (The Half of It), Alan Yang (Tigertail)

BEST ACTOR

Riz Ahmed (Sound of Metal) and Steven Yeun (Minari)

Honorable Mentions: Adarsh Gourav (The White Tiger), Dev Patel (The Personal History of David Copperfield), Harry Shum Jr. (All My Life) 

BEST ACTRESS

Yeri Han (Minari) and Leah Lewis (The Half of It)

Honorable Mentions: Hong Chau (Driveways), Tsai Chin (Lucky Grandma), Eva Noblezada (Yellow Rose)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Alan Kim (Minari) and Orion Lee (First Cow)

Honorable Mentions: Lucas Jaye (Driveways), Tzi Ma (Mulan), Rajkummar Rao (The White Tiger)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Phillipa Soo (Hamilton) and Yuh-Jung Youn (Minari)

Honorable Mentions: Priyanka Chopra Jonas (The White Tiger), Gong Li (Mulan), Lea Salonga (Yellow Rose)

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

Lee Isaac Chung (Minari) and Alice Wu (The Half of it)

Honorable Mentions: Mong-Hong Chung and Yao-Sheng Chang (A Sun), Diane Paragas (Yellow Rose), Isabel Sandoval (Lingua Franca), Alan Yang (Tigertail) 

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

Ramin Bahrani (The White Tiger) and Chloé Zhao (Nomadland)

BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

Be Water and A Thousand Cuts

Honorable Mentions: 76 Days, The Donut King, The Social Dilemma

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE

Bombay Rose and Over the Moon

Honorable Mentions: Demon Slayer: Mugen Train, On-Gaku: Our Sound, A Whisker Away

In addition to being honored by the Gold List, Gold House and CAPE are featuring exclusive conversations with some of these stars and filmmakers, including: 

All My Life (Harry Shum Jr.)

Be Water (Bao Nguyen, Shannon Lee, W. Kamau Bell, Jeff Chang)

The Donut King (coming soon) (Alice Gu)

Lingua Franca (Isabel Sandoval) 

Minari (Lee Isaac Chung, Steven Yeun, Yeri Han, Alan Kim, Yuh-Jung Youn, Noel Cho)

Mulan (Niki Caro, Yifei Liu, Yoson An, Jason Scott Lee, Tzi Ma, Rosalind Chao, Ron Yuan, Xana Tang)

Over the Moon (Cathy Ang, Janet Yang, Peilin Chou, Gennie Rim)  

Sound of Metal (coming soon) (Riz Ahmed)

The White Tiger (Adarsh Gourav, Ramin Bahrani)

Yellow Rose (Diane Paragas, Eva Noblezada, Lea Salonga, Princess Punzalan)

These panels, along with more information about Gold List, can be found at goldopen.com/goldlist.