Winner of the Bronze audience prize for Best Asian Feature at the 2025 Fantasia International Film Festival, I Fell in Love with a Z-Grade Director in Brooklyn is a captivating romantic comedy that functions as yet another endearing paean to independent horror cinema from Japanese cult filmmaker Kenichi Ugana, following last year’s We Are Aliens and The Gesuidouz.
This time, the story takes place against the backdrop of New York City’s punk subculture, centering on two souls taking huge leaps and moving to the Big Apple in search of fresh starts: one hoping to nurse a kind of artistic loss in the middle of blinding stardom, the other seizing every opportunity to pursue an unwavering love for craft. Shina – played by Ui Mihara, who took home Fantasia’s Outstanding Performance Award – is a jaded, slightly self-absorbed Japanese actress at the peak of her career whose love for cinema has suddenly gone stale, which takes her to NYC, alongside her rich, narcissistic boyfriend, Ren (Katsunari Nakagawa). Meanwhile, Jack (a charming Estevan Muñoz) is an aspiring yet virtually broke movie director who has long been waiting for his shot at celluloid immortality.
Barely a day in the big city, Shina gets ditched by her boyfriend after realizing that they only see and treat each other as prized designer items — beautiful accessories meant to enhance their best qualities. Soon, the movie star finds herself alone in a Brooklyn bar, where Jack and his unlikely crew of Black-Is-The-New-Cool hipsters casually hang out. Dead drunk and out in the street, the two run into each other. She has no money, no place to stay, and her suitcase is nowhere to be found. He needs an actor to star in his dream horror movie. They strike a deal and soon forge a compelling, if impulsive, romance.
Simple and silly as its premise might be, it is not hard to be enamored with the romantic fantasy that the movie tries to sell us, made particularly fascinating by the “opposites attract” register of the central couple, and aided capably by an emotionally resonant soundscape. Whereas Shina is the nonchalant, no-nonsense type, Jack is goofy, slightly pathetic, and boasts a personality that screams capital-A Alternative — red hair, striking neck chain and all. With a sketchy producer (played by Larry Fessenden), a lean crew, and a dream, Jack proceeds to introduce Shina to the wonder of low-budget moviemaking, which the latter initially finds as rather ridiculous yet later reignites her depleted energy for performing in front of the camera.
Of course, the movie is called “Love vs. Death,” an indie horror picture that follows an unlikely love story between a ghost and a serial killer. Ugana harnesses the movie within the movie to animate the rom-com push and pull between Shina and Jack. The director’s choice to mount the internal film on Hi8 lens gives Z-Grade Director the kind of analog and DIY aesthetic that breaks the overall appeal of the film’s cinematography that, although pretty and bright, ends up as rather postcard-esque – from the crowded Central Park to the inviting allure of the Brooklyn Bridge, which even involves a scene where the two lovers scream “I Love New York.”
Like the picture they’re shooting, Shina and Jack navigate two completely different worlds. They barely even understand each other, only relying on a voice-to-text translator app to communicate, but it is the process of creating a movie from scratch and sheer inventiveness that fascinatingly connects the two of them, itself a language that transcends what the mind and heart cannot speak.
Mihara shines in the lead role, expertly depicting how an exaggerated public persona can fracture one’s identity and artistic passion and what it’s like to rediscover that very passion. Muñoz is just as lovely and affecting in the way he seeps us in Jack’s resolve and sheer desire to will his dream into existence and never let any setback get in his way. His presence also provides a hefty dose of levity to the film’s text.
It is important to note, however, that there isn’t any real conflict in Z-Grade Director. Even Shina’s response, after learning that the crew finally discovers her celebrity status, with reporters about to swarm their final shooting day, feels more like an emotional setup edging towards the film’s closing sequence than an actual plotline. Still, the narrative lapses do not really outweigh the incredible heart of the movie and the tender, life-like ways in which it captures kinship, artistic community, and falling in love like it’s your first time. It’s the kind of feel-good, low-stakes movie that warrants an immediate rewatch.
I Fell in Love with a Z-Grade Director in Brooklyn recently played at the Fantasia International Film Festival.
Learn more about the film at the Fantasia site for the title.
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