Aoki will screen at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival on Saturday, March 13, Wednesday, March 17 and Saturday, March 20. For more information and to get tickets, visit this site.

In 2002, when Mike Cheng and his friend Ben Wang were students at UC Davis majoring in Asian American history, they went to interview Richard Aoki for a student newspaper, Third World Forum.

Cheng said meeting Aoki, a Japanese American who was one of the founding members of the Black Panther Party, made such an impression on him that although he’d never made a film before, he told Aoki he wanted to make a documentary about him.  

“I had a big mouth,” Cheng said. “He said something about how from his perspective he had yet to see a documentary that accurately reflected his perspective, and I just blurted out, ‘Let us make a documentary on you.’”  

Aoki brushed off the comment at the time, but he kept in touch with Cheng and Wang, calling them up to talk about the Iraq war and inviting them to events in the Bay Area. Then one day he called Cheng to say he’d been thinking that if his life experiences could be helpful to others, he wanted them to go ahead and make the documentary. None of them quite understood what they were getting into. 

“The next time we saw him he gave us a brown grocery bag with some VHS tapes, and said something like, ‘Here’s some speeches and why don’t you whip that together and we’ll have a 15, 20-minute documentary,’” Cheng said.  

Now, years later, after writing grants, learning about filmmaking and doing interviews with friends and Black Panther members and Aoki himself, Cheng and Wang have produced a 94-minute documentary,Aoki, that tells the story of the activist who passed away last year. Aoki grew up in West Oakland after spending the early years of his childhood in a Japanese internment camp. He became a Field Marshal in the Black Panther Party after becoming close to co-founders Huey Newton and Bobby Seale at Oakland’s Merritt College. 

Billy X Jenkins, who was an aide to Newton, and now lives in Sacramento, where he runs an archive of the Black Panther Party, said it wasn’t odd to have a Japanese American in such a powerful position in the Party.  

“There were other Asian Americans and Chicanos too – we believed in solidarity,” Jenkins said. “ If the central committee said this guy is a good guy, then this guy is a good guy.” 

Aoki was involved in all sorts of things, Jenkins said. After teaching at UC Berkeley, he was a counselor and administrator at the Peralta Community College District, where Jenkins says he was the advisor to most of the progressive groups on campus.  

“He was the man,” Jenkins said. “When he saw you, he would always have information for you. He would cut articles out of newspaper for you– this was way before email. He was a very stimulating guy.” 

Jenkins said Aoki’s involvement with groups like the Asian American Political Alliance (AAPA), who were fighting for Ethnic Studies classes has affected a lot of people.  

“That’s a big legacy,” he said. “There are a lot of people who have gone on to teach in those programs who owe their jobs to people on the front lines.”

Harvey Dong, who met Aoki at UC Berkley where he was in the AAPA with him, now teaches in the Ethnic Studies Department at UC Berkeley – the one he and Aoki helped establish. 

“He was among the more radical people in the group,” Dong said. “The AAPA was pretty eclectic – there were radicals and reformers and some Marxists. There was someone who was a Buddhist. Richard embodied the third world radicalism. He kept up with the world scene – not just the local community, but changes worldwide.” 

The documentary gives people a good opportunity to learn about social change and how individuals can make a difference through Aoki’s unique history, Dong said.  

That’s what Cheng wants. As an Asian American growing up in then mostly-white Martinez, he experienced a lot of overt racism, he said, and when a high school friend gave him an issue of the magazine, Giant Robot, with an article about Aoki, it gave him hope.  

“It blew my mind,” Cheng said. “I had no idea any there were any Asian Americans involved in the Black Power struggle I had read Malcolm X’s autobiography and some things about the Black Panther Party, but I never knew or was told or taught that any Asian Americans were involved.” 

Cheng said he appreciated meeting Aoki and hearing his more militant perspective when many of the people Cheng was in groups with at Davis were involved in things he wasn’t so interested in, such as petitions and hunger strikes.

 “A lot of activism centered around stuff I didn’t feel was effective,” Cheng said. “The way I grew up around a lot of prejudice, I had to defend myself as a kid, so I always appreciated people who said it’s OK to stand up for yourself.” 

Aoki was a mentor to him and Wang at a time when they had wanted to find their place in the world and be productive, Cheng said. He particularly hopes high school and college students will see the documentary and learn from Aoki’s example. That’s why the two who worked full-time day jobs – Wang as a grant writer and Cheng in the high tech industry, gave up five years of evenings and weekends to make the documentary.  

“The day I met him changed my life,” Cheng said. “I was really moved that night when I went home. I felt like here’s a man who’s dedicated almost his entire life to social justice and the times he was living in was a million times more dangerous. As a Field Marshall, the threat of death was very real, so if I don’t try and give my all then I’m a punk.” 

Aoki will screen at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival on Saturday, March 13, Wednesday, March 17 and Saturday, March 20. For more information and to get tickets, visit this site.