(L-R) Rachel Sennott and Katarina Zhu attend the 2025 Sundance Film Festival “Bunnylovr” premiere at Library Center Theatre. (Photo by Chad Salvador/Shutterstock for Sundance Film Festival)
By Jessica Herndon
Writer-director Katarina Zhu makes a bold entrance as a feature filmmaker with her debut, Bunnylovr, a darkly comic and deeply intimate exploration of longing, loneliness, and the search for connection in the digital age. Premiering in the U.S. Dramatic Competition at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival on January 25, the film follows Rebecca (Zhu), a drifting Chinese American cam girl who’s already fragile existence takes a tumultuous turn when she reconnects with her estranged, terminally ill father. While Rebecca attempts to navigate the delicate threads of their reconciliation, her online life (and primary source of income) begins to spiral — particularly in her increasingly toxic dynamic with a devoted yet unsettling client. Zhu delivers a captivating lead performance that anchors the film’s emotional complexity with raw vulnerability.
Zhu was inspired to write the movie after she went through a bad breakup in 2020. “Rachel was there with me,” she says, looking over at Rachel Sennott, who also stars in the film and is standing beside her during the post-premiere Q&A. “We were in it,” Sennott deadpans, causing the audience to laugh. “I was interested in exploring that space that you’re in when you’re so broken and vulnerable and so much more willing to do things that you might not normally do, like start a relationship with strange men online,” Zhu continues. “I grew up on the internet and online and I found a lot of community and validation and agency online — more online than I did in real life, and I was interested in exploring that space, too, and the dissonance between the online persona you create and then the reality of a real-life relationship that oftentimes is hateful and awkward.”
Elements of Zhu’s own estranged relationship with her father fell into the plot as well. “We haven’t spoken in 15 years,” she says of her dad, “and I went down this rabbit hole of: What if we ran into each other on the street?”
Rebecca’s ailing father is played by Perry Yung, who delivers a heartfelt performance as William. The rest of the supporting cast adds rich texture to the story, with Sennott providing a comedic edge as Rebecca’s no-nonsense best friend; Austin Amelio, who appeared in Hit Man (2024 Sundance Film Festival), bringing a twisted charm as Rebecca’s most obsessive client; and a live white bunny Rebecca names Milk, who adds a dose of tenderness.
When an audience member asks Zhu what advice she might give her character to help her stop her destructive post-breakup behavior, Zhu giggles. “Oh my gosh, honestly, this is advice Rachel gave me, but, it’s okay: You have to get it out of your system.” Adds Sennott, “You just have to go. Call the Uber. Go! Fuck him again, it’s okay. Get it out of your system.” As the room fills with the audience’s laughter, Sennott continues, “We would call each other on the phone and go, ‘Okay, one more time. You can do it this time. This is the last one. Go have sex with him one more time, then go home.’ That’s the saying. You know it. It’s just a passage of time.” Breaking out into a huge smile, Sennott quips, “Look at us now.”
There is clearly little that is off-limits between Zhu and Sennott. But when it came to what Zhu was willing to include in her film beyond the darker moments that appear, she says, “What you see in the film is actually a pulled-back version. There were earlier versions where darker things happened. Ultimately the choices that were made were in service of the prevailing feeling that I wanted people to leave with, which was hopefulness.”
