HELEN LEE

HELEN LEE is a Seoul-born, Toronto-based writer/director working primarily in fiction, as well as experimental and essay films.

As an independent filmmaker, Helen has written and directed original dramatic films starring such Canadian talents as Sandra Oh, Adam Beach, Sook-Yin Lee, Alberta Watson and Don McKellar. Her work has screened widely at international festivals such as TIFF, Clermont-Ferrand, Oberhausen and Busan International Film Festival.

Helen’s narrative and experimental films explore intersectionalities of place, identity and sexuality. They address diasporic gendered subjectivities in cinema, encompassing feminist and transnational perspectives. Films include: PARIS TO PYONGYANG (2021), INTO SUCH ASSEMBLY (2019), HERS AT LAST (2008), THE ART OF WOO (2001, feature film), SUBROSA (2000), PREY (1995), MY NIAGARA (1992), SALLY’S BEAUTY SPOT (1990). Her work is distributed by Women Make Movies (US), Arsenal (Germany), Indiestory (Korea), CFMDC and CFC Features (Canada).

Currently, Helen teaches at Queen’s University, Film & Media. She is a former Lecturer and Visiting Professor at Korea National University of Arts (KNUA), Yonsei University’s Underwood International College and Ontario College of Art (OCADU). She has published articles in film journals and magazines such as Cineaste, CineAction!, L’Avant-Scène Cinéma and Signs: Journal of Women, Culture and Society, and is co-editor of the monograph, Like Mangoes in July: The Work of Richard Fung, with novelist Kerri Sakamoto