Alika Tengan saw “Jurassic Park” while he was growing up in Kaneohe. Learning that part of the movie had been filmed only a few miles away shaped the direction of his life — yes, movies could be made in Hawaii.

Tengan graduated from Castle High School and continued his education at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, where the Academy for Creative Media was a perfect place for him to hone his skills as a writer, director and filmmaker. He also worked as a DJ at KTUH, the college radio station.

Tengan’s first full-length feature film as a director, “Every Day in Kaimuki,” starring his writing partner, Naz Kawakami, was officially released this month. It also was accepted to the venerable Sundance Film Festival, where it was screened online this week.

Kawakami plays a 20-something skateboarder and KTUH DJ, also named Naz. The character, who was born and raised in Hawaii and lives in Kaimuki, finds himself making a life-changing decision to move to New York City when his girlfriend gets a career opportunity there. For Naz that means starting over with nothing, leaving behind his circle of skateboarding friends and everything else he knows.

For more on “Every Day in Kaimuki,” visit instagram.com/everydayinkaimuki.

Tengan, 34, talked about the film from his home in Honolulu.

When did you decide to make this film?

Throughout all of 2020, almost everybody had a lot of things that they wanted to do that didn’t happen. Fast forward to the end of 2020, I found my friend was preparing to move from Hawaii for the first time. We had always talked about doing a project together, and so I kind of felt like this would be a really good opportunity.

The premise is compelling. Have you had that experience too?

One of the cool things about the film is that it’s this fusion of personal experiences and things that we both thought about. I’ve lived here my whole life and I definitely had times similar to the character in the movie — feeling like I’m in a creative rut and wanting to switch things up. I visited some friends in Portland (Oregon) in 2017 and really fell in love with the city. I was very close, I think, to making that move, but for a lot of reasons I don’t think I had the courage to do it.

What do you want audiences to get from the movie?

One thing we are trying to emphasize is that while this film takes place during a pandemic, the pandemic is not an essential component of what’s happening in the film. But it does frame a lot of the characters’ decisions. And for anybody watching the film who is weighing some momentous decision that they’re sort of on the fence about, I hope the film spurs them more strongly in one direction, or the other.

The film is a great window into Hawaii skateboard culture. Are you and Naz active skateboarders?

I definitely skated for a few years when I was in high school and am still a fan of the culture. Naz definitely still skates.

The movie is also going to be a great time capsule of Honolulu and of Hawaii skateboard culture as of 2021. Was that part of the project for you?

Certainly. Honolulu is undergoing constant construction and reconstruction and, unfortunately, the population is already overpopulated and foreign influences keep trying to encroach on a lot of things that are happening here. The element of preservation of this moment, of this place in time, is a really cool part of that to me. And as it relates to skateboard culture, that’s pretty interesting too.

How do you get away from the job of filmmaking?

I love the NBA. I grew up playing in (a local) basketball league, and basketball has been a part of my life since I was a little kid. I still really enjoy watching the NBA and playing video games on a PS5.

What’s next?

We were fortunate enough last year to have been awarded a grant from Google to make my next feature film, which is an adaptation of my short film (“Mauka to Makai”) we made two years ago. We’re going to try to do it some time this year.