Sam Lorn leads the way

Sam Lorn, 40, is a pioneer of Cambodian-American cinema. He’s an accomplished independent filmmaker with thirteen years experience in the film industry as an actor, screenwriter, producer and director. He’s produced three feature-length films including Young Survivor (1999) and Lovesick (2005) that bring modern Cambodian-American experiences to the big screen, he’s written ten screenplays and had parts in several films and on television. He’s currently in Cambodia filming District Lights, a drama based in Phnom Penh and has another drama, Moira, in production.

Born in Cambodia, Lorn lost two brothers and a sister to the Khmer Rouge regime and with his parents and six siblings emigrated to America in 1978 and settled in Long Beach, California. In 1984, during his senior year in high school, Lorn was shot by a local street gang and was sent to live with his older brother in Houston. However, street life tempted him into meandering through ten cities in seven states until the death of a close friend in 1991 motivated him to turn his life around. He headed to New York and gradually worked his way into films, studying and learning his trade at such places as the New York Film Academy and HB Studios. In 1997 he founded Refugee Productions, a filmmaking entity, as well as Forlorn Films, an independent distribution arm.