The fourth installment of the New York Asian Film Festival is set to begin this Friday, June 17th. The festival's main goal is to dissuade the myths and stereotypes associated with Asian cinema by offering up some of the most recent films from the continent, most of which have never been seen in this hemisphere. So if you're looking for stereotypical martial arts or large lizardlike monsters don't bother attending.

Based on the success of the first three annual installments the New York Asian Film Festival has expanded to 30 films and will run for over two weeks. The showcase piece will be the pan-Asian horror anthology "Three…Extremes" featuring short segments from Japan's Takashi Miike, Korea's Park Chan-Wook, and China's Fruit Chan. This film will get just one showing at the festival before its October release from Lions Gate Films.

If you live in New York or happen to be visiting between June 17 and July 2, the festival will be running almost every weeknight and all weekend long at the Anthology Film Archives and the ImaginAsian Theatre. More information and advance tickets can be found at Subway Cinema website:
http://www.subwaycinema.com