Freestyle acquires Doua Moua’s Hmong family drama The Harvest

Freestyle Digital Media, the digital distribution arm of Byron Allen’s Allen Media Group, has acquired U.S. rights to The Harvest, an acclaimed Hmong American family drama written by and starring Doua Moua, best known for his roles in Gran Torino and Mulan, according to Variety.

Directed by Caylee So, whose previous film In the Life of Music was Cambodia’s official Oscar submission, The Harvest centers on Thai, a man returning from San Francisco to his Southern California hometown, where he confronts estranged family members and a traditional father battling kidney failure. The film explores intergenerational trauma, cultural identity, and reconciliation within a Hmong household.

As reported by The Wrap, Moua developed the screenplay in 2009, drawing on personal experiences and frustrations with industry representation. “I was told my type of Asian does not fit into the narrative of America,” he said, adding that the film’s decade-long journey to screen mirrors the broader push for Southeast Asian American visibility. “We too are American,” he emphasized.

Director Caylee So echoed this sentiment: “Growing up as a Southeast Asian American, there were no stories on film that reflected that of my own. It is still rare,” she said in The Wrap. “But the industry is evolving. Stories once left in the dark are now finding their way to the screen.”

RELATED: See our review of The Harvest here

The ensemble cast includes Perry Yung (Warrior), Dawn Ying Yuen, Chrisna Chhor, and Lucas Velazquez, with Moua in the lead role. The film premiered at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival and continued its festival run through Outfest Fusion, CAAMFest, and the Minneapolis St. Paul International Film Festival, earning awards at the Seattle Asian American Film Festival and the Cambodian International Film Festival, as described by Variety.

Moua produced the film with John Houselog under their Chiyou Entertainment banner. Executive producers include Yoson An, Moua’s Mulan co-star, as well as Money Vang, Jaeson Ma, and Eric Tu of EST Studios — a company committed to globalizing Asian stories. Recent EST projects include Hidden Letters (Oscar-shortlisted) and K-Pops! by Anderson .Paak. The company also produced Indonesia’s highest-grossing 2025 film Pabrik Gula, due for U.S. release this April.

The Harvest was a finalist on the CAPE x Black List and a semi-finalist in the Academy Nicholl Fellowship competition. It was financed, in part, through Dogecoin organically converted to USD, according to The Wrap.

Freestyle will release the film across all major digital platforms and on home video formats starting June 20. The acquisition adds to the distributor’s growing catalog of culturally rich indie titles, including Allswell in New York and Survive.