EVENT: Flash Forward: Debut Works and Recent Films by Notable Japanese Directors
DATES: December 3-23, 2021
VENUE: Online / Japan Society, Auditorium
Highlighting the early efforts of now-established contemporary filmmakers, the second ACA Cinema Project series Flash Forward: Debut Works and Recent Films by Notable Japanese Directors takes an intimate look at six of Japan’s most well-known directors: Naomi Kawase, Miwa Nishikawa, Shuichi Okita, Junji Sakamoto, Akihiko Shiota and Masayuki Suo. Pairing each debut with a recent work, the series presents two distinct facets of each filmmaker’s career—encouraging dialogue and interplay as well as tracking the development of their signature voice. By drawing parallels and contrasts between past and present, Flash Forward illuminates the importance of these pivotal early works within each artist’s career. Co-presented by the Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan, in collaboration with Visual Industry Promotion Organization.
Event Title：Flash Forward: Conversations with the Filmmakers Part I
Speaker：Masayuki Suo, Naomi Kawase, Junji Sakamoto
*online
Event Title：Flash Forward: Conversations with the Filmmakers Part II
Speaker：Akihiko Shiota, Miwa Nishikawa, Shuichi Okita
*online
Event Title：Panel Discussion: Debut Works and Beyond
Speaker：Aaron Gerow(Professor at Yale University,Scholar of Japanese and other East Asian film and media), Takuya Tsunoda(Assistant Professor of Japanese Film and Media at Columbia University), Junko Yamazaki(UCLA assistant Professor Asian Languages & cultures Department), Jasper Sharp(Arrow Films writer,film curator,filmmaker)
*online
Title: Suzaku
Director: Naomi Kawase
1997/95 min./ Japan
[STORY] Amidst billowing trees and the gentle rustling of golden-hued thickets, Suzaku entrenches itself in a forgotten way of life nestled deep within the mountainous stretches of Nara Prefecture—a natural paradise untouched by the ripples of modernization, existing as a world unto itself. Along winding dirt paths and gravel roads, the continual exodus of locals and a now-abandoned railroad project haunt the depressed town of Nishiyoshino-mura, the forestry village which teenager Michiru (Machiko Ono) and her family call home. When tragedy strikes, this small-town family must overcome the day-to-day struggles of quotidian life. Taking its title from the ancient Chinese deity known to be the guardian of the south, Suzaku is a natural extension of Kawase’s small-gauge documentary beginnings, brimming with the true realities and hardships of the region and gorgeously shot on 16mm.
©1996 WOWOW / Bandai Visual
Title: Vision
Director: Naomi Kawase
2018/110 min./ Japan
[STORY] A fabled herb powerful enough to cure all sufferings of the human spirit draws a French journalist (Juliette Binoche) to the fog-enshrouded forests of Nara Prefecture. During her search within the lush landscape she meets several keepers of the forest: Tomo, and his blind senior Aki, who has begun sensing unusual shifts in the environment. As the herb’s once-in-a-millennium return approaches, Aki suddenly disappears—leaving Jeanne and Tomo to navigate increasing disturbances in their surroundings. Vision, true to its title, shines for Kawase’s powerful haptic visuality, as well as the modes of extralinguistic communication it affords her quietly focused characters in the film’s moving contemplation of human existence.
© 2018 “Vision” LDH JAPAN, SLOT MACHINE, KUMIE INC.
Title: Wild Berries
Director: Miwa Nishikawa
2002/108 min./ Japan
[STORY] Produced by Hirokazu Kore-eda, the first feature from Miwa Nishikawa (who previously worked on Kore-eda’s Afterlife and Distance) wryly paints a bleakly cynical portrait of the Akechis, a dysfunctional family hiding behind a thin veil of normalcy and traditional values. Comically grotesque and dark, Nishikawa’s debut spends no time splitting hairs to construct a revealing snapshot of a family on the precipice of disintegration: a father who cannot admit to his family that he’s been out of work for years; a dutiful mother burdened by caretaking her senile father-in-law; an idealistic schoolteacher daughter engaged to be married; and a good-for-nothing son whose streetwise talents shine in his profession of con artist. When father Yoshiro’s debts are publicly revealed—causing scandal among neighbors and relatives—the family plunges headfirst into crisis, desperately attempting to stave off further misfortune as their worlds fall apart.
© WILD BERRIES Project Team
Title: The Long Excuse
Director: Miwa Nishikawa
2016/124 min./ Japan
[STORY] Popular novelist Sachio (Motoki Masahiro, Fancy Dance) is discontent and jaded after years of success; his 20-year marriage is lifeless and loveless while his own indiscretions have led to adultery. When his wife Natsuko and her best friend Yuki suddenly die in a freak accident, Sachio finds that he must act the part of bereaved husband despite a resounding apathy. By chance, he meets Yuki’s devastated husband Yoichi and their two children. Struck by the family’s sincerity and openness, Sachio decides, on a whim, to help care for the children while Yoichi is at work. As Sachio’s fondness for them grows, feelings that he thought were long gone begin to resurface. An adaptation of Nishikawa’s novel of the same name, The Long Excuse is a remarkably moving character study, relentlessly confronting the emotional turbulence of grief, mourning and regret in the aftermath of loss.
©2016 “The Long Excuse” Production Committee
Title: The Chef of South Polar
Director: Shuichi Okita
2009/125 min./ Japan
[STORY] Passionate cook Jun Nishimura (Masato Sakai) leaves his family behind to join an eclectic team of eight Antarctic researchers at the Dome Fuji Station for a year and half. Tasked with cooking for the crew, Nishimura lovingly prepares elaborate dishes and hearty meals, providing warmth and comfort amid the frigid Antarctic temperatures. Not knowing what the next day may bring, the crew encounters an abundance of both major and minor crises including ramen shortages, relationship issues, loneliness and homesickness. Okita’s quirky humor and lighthearted tone bring heart to this true tale of camaraderie as the crew tries to make a home for itself in the most inhospitable regions of the polar south.
© 2009 “THE CHEF OF SOUTH POLAR” Film Partners
Title: Ora, Ora Be Goin’ Alone
Director: Shuichi Okita
2020/137 min./ Japan
[STORY] Seventy-five-year-old Momoko (Yuko Tanaka) lives a solitary existence, residing in a large, empty house after the death of her husband. With each day blending into the next, Momoko’s loneliness manifests itself in peculiar ways—she starts to have visions of her past, accompanied by the sudden appearance of three imaginary men named Ora (meaning “I” in her native Tohoku dialect). Okita’s offbeat surrealism playfully dips between past and present as Momoko reaches back to her younger years for comfort—from her initial arrival to Tokyo as a runaway (played by Yu Aoi) to falling in love—resulting in the resurgence of unfulfilled dreams, regrets and doubts. A contemplative and whimsical meditation on a long-lived life, Ora, Ora Be Goin’ Alone is a gentle and mature exploration of loneliness that skillfully brings comedy and humor to its melancholic subject matter.
©2020 Ora, Ora Be Goin’ Alone Film Partners
Title: Knockout
Director: Junji Sakamoto
1989/110 min./ Japan
[STORY] After narrowly surviving a traumatic brain injury, macho pro boxer Eiji Adachi (Hidekazu Akai) puts his life on the line for another chance at boxing glory—vying for a comeback despite the seriousness of his condition. A hyper-masculine brute with a devil-may-care attitude, the hot-tempered Adachi starts again from the ground up, launching his own Osaka training gym with the hopes of returning to the ring. At times comically absurd, Sakamoto’s film brings a satirical yet bleak approach to the self-destructive nature of the boxer, further bolstered by the very fact that the film is based on the life and career of lead actor Akai himself. A bittersweet tale of resilience and hardship, Knockout proved to be a word-of-mouth hit, garnering widespread popularity upon release, and has since cemented itself as one of the landmark debuts of the ‘80s.
©1990 GAGACOMMUNICATIONS ALL RIGHT RESERVED
Title: The Projects
Director: Junji Sakamoto
2016/103 min./ Japan
[STORY] Whether it’s someone mixing burnables and recyclables or noise from a neighbor’s domestic spat, there’s always something annoying the residents of a housing project in the suburbs of Osaka. However Hinako (Naomi Fujiyama) and Seiji (Ittoku Kishibe) couldn’t care less. Having moved in just six months ago after the closure of their herbal medicine shop, the old couple is reluctantly putting their life back together. But when Seiji disappears, the apartment rumor mill churns: divorce, murder, dismemberment? As the story spins out of control, and a mysterious man with a parasol puts in a tall order of natural remedies, the truth turns out to be even more fantastic than gossip. Melding into a surprising mix of genres, The Projects ranges from an incisive comedy of errors to absurdist adventure and even a moving late-life romance.
©Nikkatsu
Title: Harmful Insect
Director: Akihiko Shiota
2002/92 min./ Japan
[STORY] Thirteen-year-old Sachiko (Aoi Miyazaki, Eureka) finds her life set adrift after her father’s desertion and a suicide attempt by her mother. As she tries to make sense of it all—from her mother’s lack of parental guidance to the pervasive rumors circulating about her at school—Sachiko stops attending classes, preferring instead to spend her days with a pair of social outcasts while exchanging letters with her former teacher. A raw portrait of fleeting childhood and forced maturation, Shiota’s tragic tale of troubled youth finds Sachiko desperately trying to find her way in an increasingly cruel world.
©2002 NIKKATSU / TBS / SONY PCL
Title: Farewell Song
Director: Akihiko Shiota
2019/116 min./ Japan
[STORY] Popular indie folk duo Haruleo—a portmanteau of singers Haru (Mugi Kadowaki, Aristocrats) and Leo (Nana Komatsu)—embark on a seven-date tour as one final hurrah before officially disbanding. Barely on speaking terms, the pair take on the passive Shima (Ryo Narita) as a roadie in their employ to help soothe the tension and keep the band from falling apart. The strained relationship and history between once-close friends is slowly unveiled throughout endless highways, gas stations, diners and rest stops as Shiota intersperses glimpses of the past with the minutiae of the tour. Travelling ever closer to their final destination, the trio must come to terms with their eventual break-up and final farewell.
©2019 "FAREWELL SONG" FILM PARTNERS