Everything Will Be was the first documentary film for Kwan, whose first feature Eve and the Fire Horse was a fictional comic account of growing up Chinese in Vancouver.
[1] Kwan and Christensen had initially explored the idea of making a film that contrasted Vancouver’s fading Chinatown with the thriving Golden Village in nearby Richmond, until Kwan realized her passion was in documenting Chinatown’s historic sites and businesses before they disappeared: "One day I was walking down Pender Street and within a two-block radius I counted like 20 shuttered shops … herbalists and knick-knack shops and green grocers.
Since she characterizes her own command of Cantonese as "highly suspect," Kwan had a researcher and translator with her much of the time.
She found herself drawn to the stories of elderly residents, who reminded her of her own parents and the people she grew up with.
The film's title is inspired by a neon installation by Martin Creed, which reads "Everything is going to be alright," overlooking the neighbourhood from atop real estate developer Bob Rennie's art museum in Chinatown’s Wing Sang building.