Year: 2018

Tomorrow is Another Day (黃金花, Chan Tai-lee, 2017)

May 11, 2018by Hayley Scanlon1 Comment

Middle-aged malaise is fast becoming a dominant theme in Chinese language cinema, but the pressures faced by the heroine of the debut feature from Ip Man screenwriter Chan Tai-lee are compounded by a series of additional responsibilities and the relative lack of support available to help her cope with them. Tomorrow is Another Day (黃金花) is, in many ways, a family drama with a sympathetic depiction of the demands of caring for a child with special needs at its centre, but it’s also the story of a marriage and of the essential bonds between a mother and a son as the family struggles to survive in a sometimes hostile environment.

Mrs. Wong (Teresa Mo), interviewed at a community centre, relates the routines of her daily life to a camera crew. Describing herself as a “regular housewife”, Mrs. Wong’s existence revolves around caring for her husband (Ray Lui) – a driving instructor, and her 20-year-old autistic son, Kwong (Ling Man-lung). She tells the film crew she is happy with her life and on one level she is, but she also fears her philandering husband is up to his old tricks again. Mr. Wong is indeed having an affair with one of his pupils, a much younger nurse called Daisy (Bonnie Xian Seli) who seems to have well and truly got her hooks into him. Knowing of her husband’s string of extra-marital affairs which has spanned the entirety of the marriage, Mrs. Wong has made a decision to turn a blind eye for the sake of her son but this latest dalliance has proved difficult for her to bear. After Daisy randomly invites herself into the family home when Mrs. Wong is shopping, the couple argue and Mr. Wong walks out leaving Mrs. Wong to care for Kwong all alone.

Kwong, usually cheerful and well behaved, experiences occasional meltdowns when told he can’t have something that he wants, often resorting to frustrated acts of self harm including bashing his head against nearby solid objects. Though Kwong is not violent towards others, he is now a grown man and much stronger than his mother who finds it difficult to help him calm down on her own. Mr. Wong’s forearms are a mess of scars and bruises received whilst trying to restrain his son from hurting himself, and the physical strain of caring him has often weighed heavy on his conflicted father’s mind.

Though Mrs. Wong and Kwong experience frequent discrimination from those who are unaware of his needs – other mothers pull their children out of the playground when Kwong comes to play, and Mrs. Wong finds it difficult to get a part-time job when her prospective employers spot Kwong standing beside her, the other neighbourhood housewives have become used to Kwong’s way of being and are keen to help out where they can. Like Mrs. Wong, many of the other women have their own problems whether worrying about the (lack of) academic progress of their sons, or trying to combat the potential loneliness of early widowhood through friendship and community. Hearing of Mrs. Wong’s marital problems via the neighbourhood grapevine (another source of humiliation for Mrs. Wong), everyone has taken her side against the villainous Daisy but they’re also worried Mrs. Wong may consider harming herself while faced with so many conflicting pressures.

Mrs. Wong however, has half her mind on revenge and has taken to watching crime documentaries which give her the idea that she could get herself a convenient alibi by going to the Mainland by official means and then smuggling herself back in to off Daisy in the hope that her husband might finally remember his responsibilities. Daisy, it has to be said, is a one note villain and it’s difficult to see why she is so intent on pursuing a dead end romance with a middle-aged, married, driving instructor without coming to the conclusion that she must love causing trouble, especially as Mr. Wong seems to find her quite irritating even once he’s taken the “decision” to leave his family for her. Mr. Wong himself is also a bundle of contradictions but emerges as a weak willed man who has never been able to fully commit to his marriage and struggles with the responsibility involved in being the father of a child with special needs. Though he eventually seems to reconcile himself to his role as his son’s father and his wife’s husband, there is something conceited in his belief that his family will simply take him back when he has caused them so much pain and suffering by his hastily taken decision to abandon them.

Kwong is more perceptive than his mother gives him credit for, and Mrs. Wong too is eventually forced to consider the effect her darkening mindset has had on his emotional wellbeing. Tomorrow is Another Day offers no easy answers in its sympathetic portrayal of a middle-aged woman driven to extremes by a series of conflicting pressures but eventually finds finds comfort in living in the now as the family begins to find its way home, cutting through the noise of a high pressure city to rediscover what it is that’s really important.

Tomorrow is Another Day receives its US premiere as the closing night film of the sixth season of Chicago’s Asian Pop-Up Cinema programme on 16th May, 2018. The screening begins at 7pm, AMC River East 21 and tickets are already on sale via the official website.

Asian Pop-Up Cinema will return for the seventh season in the autumn – make sure you’re up to date with all the latest information by following the festival on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Vimeo.

Original trailer (Cantonese with English/Traditional Chinese subtitles)

The Running Actress (여배우는 오늘도, Moon So-ri, 2017)

May 10, 2018by Hayley Scanlon4 Comments

In international eyes at least, Moon So-ri is one of Korea’s most prominent actresses. She has worked with such highly esteemed directors as Lee Chang-dong, Hong Sang-soo, and Park Chan-wook, yet she continues to face the same kinds of issues as many women in the film industry despite her immense critical success and popularity at the box office. The Running Actress (여배우는 오늘도, Yeobaewooneun Oneuldo) is her first feature as a director and brings together three of her short films which neatly form a tryptic depicting the trials and tribulations of the contemporary actress.

Moon also stars in the films, playing a character called Moon So-ri, apparently inspired by her “real” life. Kicking off with the first segment titled The Actress, Moon introduces the fears and anxieties which recur throughout most notably in her preoccupation with gaining good roles and worrying that she is losing out on them though not being “pretty” enough. Her friends, attempting to be supportive, only add to her discomfort by assuring her that she is pretty “in her own way” and reminding her that in any case she is a wonderful actress. Confidence at rock bottom, Moon laments that her industry prefers airheaded beauty to technical skill and is unwilling to accept that women continue to exist past the age of 25 without suddenly morphing into spiky aunties and salty grandmas. Unexpectedly running into a producer whilst hiking, she gets a temporary boost when it seems he has her in mind for a dream project with a director she’s long wanted to work with but is dismayed when she realises the character has a college age child meaning she’ll be making a possibly irreversible step into playing suffering mothers rather than interesting women with nuanced character arcs.

Meanwhile, she runs into the producer and his friends at an inn on the way down and is forced to endure a drinking session with two starstruck fans whose increasingly drunken conversation turns to the rude and loutish in which they too begin picking apart Moon’s looks while mocking her acting skills, one of them even offering a slightly offensive caricature of her award winning performance as a disabled woman in Lee Chang-dong’s Oasis (the title of which he seems to have forgotten).

Moon’s fears and insecurities follow her into her family life in the second chapter, The Running Actress, which finds her attempting to juggle the demands of being a wife and mother with her acting career. In a running joke, everyone seems to assume that mega famous actress Moon So-ri must be filthy rich but like everyone else she has trouble making ends meet, especially as she is constantly worrying over where the next job is coming from. As if that wasn’t enough she also has to put up with her mother continuing to treat her like a petulant teenager (which to be fair her behaviour sometimes mimics) and trading photo opportunities for free dental work, while her adorable little daughter is sharp as a tack.

The social and the professional come together in the final segment which sees Moon attend the funeral for a director she once worked with years ago and to tell the truth did not particularly like. Planning to show her face but not stay very long, Moon is dismayed to realise she is one of an extremely small number of mourners which include a drunken actor she doesn’t really get on with either, and an aspiring young actress who may have been involved in an improper relationship with the late director in the hope of furthering her career. In a lovely human touch, Moon breaks away from the rapidly declining situation at the wake to spend some time with the director’s young son who has been left all alone watching a few home videos his father shot by means of a handheld projector.

The film takes its title from a humorous moment in the second chapter in which Moon suddenly orders her driver to stop the car and jumps out to run away screaming, making a bid for frustrated freedom from her often exasperating life and career. Moon is obviously not afraid to poke fun at herself or her industry, taking her (presumably very real) fears and insecurities and exposing them for all to see. Taking a cue from Hong Sang-soo, Moon’s deadpan style only adds to the comic effect of her razor sharp dialogue which is filled with small moments of everyday humour somehow assuming wider dimensions thanks to the well crafted nature of the script. Addressing real problems faced by women today in all walks of life, The Running Actress is a warm and funny effort from the veteran performer turned first time director and will hopefully pave the way for an interesting second career.

Screened at the 20th Udine Far East Film Festival.

Original trailer (Korean subtitles only)

Mori, The Artist’s Habitat (モリのいる場所, Shuichi Okita, 2018)

May 9, 2018by Hayley Scanlon2 Comments

The world is vast and incomprehensible, but a lifetime’s study may begin to illuminate its hidden depths. At least it’s been that way for the hero of Shuichi Okita’s latest attempt at painting the joys and perils of a bubble existence. Mori, The Artist’s Habitat (モリのいる場所, Mori no Iru Basho) revolves around the real life figure of Morikazu Kumagai (Tsutomu Yamazaki), a well respected Japanese artist best known for his avant-garde depictions of the natural world, as well as for his eccentric personality. When we first meet him the early 1970s, Mori (a neat pun on his given name which uses the character for “protect” but also means “forest”), is 94 years old and has rarely left his beloved garden for the last 30 years. A man out of time, Mori’s world is however threatened by encroaching modernity – a gang of mobbed up property developers is after his land and is already in the process of constructing an apartment block that will rob Mori’s wonderful garden of its rightful sunlight.

Okita introduces us to Mori through an amusing scene which finds the Japanese emperor “admiring” one of his artworks only to turn around in confusion and ask how old the child was that made this painting. Spanning the Meiji and the Showa eras, Mori’s artwork is defined by its bold use of colour and minimalist aesthetic which outlines only the most essential elements of his subjects. As his wife of 52 years, Hideko (Kirin Kiki), explains to the various visitors who turn up at Mori’s studio/home hoping to commission him, Mori only paints what he feels like painting when he feels like painting it. Getting him to do anything else is a losing battle.

Painting mainly at night, Mori spends his days observing the natural world. Wandering around his garden he stops to sit in various places, gazing at the ants, and playing with the fish he put into a small pond dug way down into the earth over a period of 30 years. Despite his distaste for “visitors”, Mori has consented to be the subject of a documentary, followed around by a photojournalist (Ryo Kase) and his assistant (Kaito Yoshimura) keen to capture him in his “natural habitat”. The photographers, natural “shutterbugs”, gaze at Mori in the same way he gazes at his trees and insects. An irony which is not lost on the reticent artist.

Okita neatly symbolises Mori’s world as a place out of time by hovering over his desk on which lies a disassembled pocket watch. Eventually the watch will be repaired and time set back in motion but until now Mori’s garden has been a refuge of natural pleasures which itself contains the world entire. Receiving a surprise visitation from a supernatural being (Hiroshi Mikami), Mori is given an opportunity to explore the universe but turns it down. Firstly he doesn’t want to leave his wife on her own or see her “tired” by his absence, but secondly his garden has always been big enough for him and given thousands of years he fears he may never be able to explore it fully.

The garden, however, may not survive its owner. The 1970s, marked by early turmoil, later became a calm period of rising economic prosperity in which society began to move away from post-war privation towards economic prosperity. Hence our big bad is a property developer set on building apartment blocks – a symbol and symptom of the move away from large multi-generational homes to cramped nuclear family modernity. Unbeknownst to Mori, his garden has become a focal point for the environmental protest movement who have begun to set up signs and slogans around his home attacking the property developers for ruining a national landmark which has important cultural value in appreciating the work of one of Japan’s best known working artists.

Having lived through so much turmoil, Mori takes this in his stride. He knows his garden won’t last forever, and is resigned to the nature of the times. Mori may prefer to spend his days in quiet contemplation resenting the constant interruptions from all his “visitors” but makes time to talk seriously with those who seek his guidance such one of the developers (Munetaka Aoki) who’s brought along one of his son’s drawings, convinced that he must be a “genius”. Mori takes one look and tells him frankly that it’s awful, but adds that that’s a good thing – those with “talent” rarely do anything of note and even if it’s “bad” art is still art. Nevertheless there are those who try to profit from his work for less than altruistic purposes – the hand-painted nameplate from outside the house is forever being stolen and he’s constantly petitioned to provide his services in service of someone else’s business.

Okita’s characterisation of the later life of a famous artist is another study of genial eccentricity as its hero commits himself fully to living in a way which pleases him, only bristling at those who describe his gnome-like garden presence as resembling a “Chinese Hermit Sage”. Mori himself is, of course, another living thing enjoying the natural world to its fullest and if it’s true that his time is ending there is something inescapably sad in looking up from the shadows of apartment blocks and finding nothing but lifeless concrete.

Screened at the 20th Udine Far East Film Festival. Mori, The Artist’s Habitat will also be screened as the opening gala of the 2018 Nippon Connection Japanese film festival, and will receive its North American premiere at Japan Cuts in July where Kirin Kiki will also receive the 2018 Cut Above Award.

Original trailer (no subtitles)

Everything Goes Wrong (すべてが狂ってる, Seijun Suzuki, 1960)

May 8, 2018May 8, 2018by Hayley ScanlonLeave a comment

The Tokyo of 1960 was one defined by unrest as the biggest protests in history filled the streets urging the government to rethink the renewal of the security treaty Japan had signed with America after the war in order to provide military support in the absence of a standing army. Yet the protests themselves are perhaps an indication of the extent to which the nation was already recovering. With the Olympics just four years away, post-war privation had been replaced by a rapidly expanding economy, dynamic global outlook, and increased possibilities for the young who enjoyed both greater personal freedom than their parents’ generation and a kind of optimism unthinkable merely ten years previously. Nevertheless, this sense of the new, of unchecked potential was itself disorientating and had, as some saw it, led to a moral decline in which youth aimlessly idled its time away on self indulgent pleasures – namely drink, drugs, promiscuous sex and American jazz.

This dark side of youth had become a talking point thanks to a series of notorious “Sun Tribe” movies produced by the youth-orientated Nikkatsu studios. The films were so controversial the studio was eventually forced to stop making them, but all they really did was tone down the shock factor to one of mild outrage. Seijun Suzuki, picking up the Sun Tribe mantle, goes further than most in Everything Goes Wrong (すべてが狂ってる, Subete ga Kurutteru), painting post-war malaise as a tragedy of generational disconnection as the chastened wartime generation, accepting their role in history, watch their children hurtle headlong down another alleyway of self destruction but are ultimately unable to save them.

Our “hero”, Jiro (Tamio Kawaji), is as someone later poignantly puts it, “a nice boy”. A student, he spends his spare time on the fringes of gang of petty delinquents who get their kicks freaking squares, engaging in acts of casual prostitution, and enacting non-violent muggings. Jiro’s main problem in life is his fierce attachment to his single-mother, Masayo (Tomoko Naraoka). After Jiro’s father was killed in the war (apparently run over by a Japanese tank), Masayo became involved with a married man who has been supporting herself and Jiro for the last ten years. Young enough to have an almost completely black and white approach to moral justice, Jiro cannot stomach this fact and accuses his mother of being a virtual prostitute, accepting money for sex without love.

Jiro repeatedly accuses the older generation of hypocrisy, that they lie about their true feelings and motivations whilst denying their responsibility for the war which took his father’s life. Yet, Nambara (Shinsuke Ashida), his mother’s lover, is a kind and honest man who answers every question put to him honestly and with fierce moral integrity. He admits his responsibility for the folly of war – something he feels keenly seeing as he is a weapons engineer by trade, but rejects Jiro’s characterisation of his relationship with Masayo as something essentially immoral. His justifications are perhaps, as Jiro puts it, “philanderer’s clichés”, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t true. Nambara, as a young man, entered into an arranged marriage with the daughter of a now deceased general. The marriage is loveless and emotionally dead, but Nambara is an earnest person and will honour the commitment he made to his first wife even if it brings him personal pain. Masayo has always known this and even if he cannot legally marry her, Nambara has given her his heart and will also honour that commitment in continuing to try and make her son see that he is not the enemy, just another man who loves his mother.

There is something quite ironic in Jiro’s strangely conservative moral universe which rejects the “impure” nature of his mother’s romance, while the older generation are better positioned to understand that things are never as simple as they seem. Jiro is rigid and unforgiving where his parents are flexible and empathetic. He rejects his mother for being a “whore” but throws money at a girl who is in love with him because he thinks that’s what women “want”. Unable to accept her emotional needs, he thinks of her as a prostitute and thereby abnegates his responsibility – the exact opposite of the “goodness” Nambara displays in offering financial support for a woman he loves which (in his eyes) has no particular strings and is given only with the intention of making her life easier.

Jiro, infected both by mother and madonna/whore complexes, is profoundly disturbed when another young woman tries to point out that aside from being his mother Masayo is also a woman with normal human needs both emotional and physical. Following his botched attempt to blacken Nambara in her eyes, he drags his mother to a breezy youth fuelled beach party where he throws her into a tent full of lithe young male bodies and tells her to have her fill. Nambara, still determined to talk Jiro around, laments to Masayo that they never had the opportunity to experience the kind of freedom that these youngsters feel themselves entitled to. If only they were not so trapped by the social codes of their era, they might have been happy. Yet these youngsters, with everything in front of them, are anything but – determined to destroy themselves in nihilistic confusion, caught in a moment of flux when nothing is certain and everything is possible.

At the film’s conclusion, a cynical journalist remarks to a sympathetic mama-san that “today, goodwill between people can’t exist anywhere, everything has gone wrong”. Jiro’s tragic fate is that he, like many “nice” kids like him, cannot reconcile himself to the moral greyness of the post-war world in which the “heroic sacrifice” of their parents’ is hypocritically held up as wholesome entertainment. Unable to accept the love and kindness of Nambara who only wants to act as a father to him and continues to believe that “one day he will understand” even after Jiro has hurt him deeply both emotionally and physically, Jiro has only one direction in which to turn.

Suzuki weaves Jiro’s tale around that of his friends – the unhappy delinquents and the struggling workers, women used by men who promise them love but reject their responsibilities, women who think they have to trade something to win love which ought to be freely given, and the older generation who can do nothing more than look on with sadness as youth destroys itself. Suzuki’s sympathies lie with everyone, but more than most with the Nambaras of the world who are desperately trying to fix what was broken but find that in a world that’s already gone crazy kindness is met with suspicion while money, corrupting true emotional connection, has become the only arbiter of bitter truths.

Nippon Connection 2018 to Open with Mori, The Artist’s Habitat

May 7, 2018May 9, 2018by Hayley Scanlon2 Comments

Nippon Connection, the largest showcase for Japanese cinema anywhere in the world, returns with over 100 brand new and classic films screening in Frankfurt from 29th May to 3rd June. The festival will open with the latest from Shuichi Okita, Mori: The Artist’s Habitat, and pay tribute to guest of honour Shinobu Terajima with screenings of Oh Lucy!, The City of Betrayal, and Dear Etranger, plus a special presentation of Ryuichi Hiroki’s Vibrator. The programme in full:

Nippon Cinema

Bamy – school friends reunite after many years, but their burgeoning romance is frustrated by a dark secret – the ability to see ghosts!
Birds Without Names – A young woman lives with an older man for reasons of convenience while continuing to pine for the violent boyfriend who has been missing for the last eight years in Kazuya Shiraishi’s dark romance. Review.
The Blood of Wolves – Koji Yakusho stars as a rogue cop trying to keep a lid on a yakuza gang war as Kazuya Shirashi updates Battles Without Honour for the bubble era. Review.
The City of Betrayal – an unhappy housewife and a depressed young man begin an unwise affair in Daisuke Miura’s romantic drama – with award presentation for guest of honour Shinobu Terajima. Review.
Dear Etranger – Tadanobu Asano stars as a “batsuichi” step-father encountering unexpected resistance from the elder of his second wife’s two daughters as the new couple expect their first child.
Destiny: The Tale of Kamakura – Mystery author Masakazu wakes up one morning to discover his wife has disappeared in the legendary city of Kamakura where humans and spiritual creatures co-exist.
Enokida Trading Post – Kiyohiko Shibukawa stars in this small town comedy in which a young man returns home from Tokyo to start afresh.
Flower and Sword – Samurai flower arranging!
Foreboding – Kiyoshi Kurosawa presages the apocalypse in this companion piece to Before We Vanish. Review.
Hanagatami – Nobuhiko Obayashi completes a personal passion project in examining youth on the brink of war.
Moon and Thunder – Yasuko, a young woman living alone, is prompted into a reevaluation of her life after her family unexpectedly descend on her home.
Mori: The Artist’s Habitat – Shuichi Okita returns with another portrait of an eccentric in the serene and sometimes surreal life of artist Mori Kumagai. Opening Night Gala.
Occult Bolshevism – A seance in an abandoned factory provokes malicious results in this horror feature from Ring scriptwriter Hiroshi Takahashi.
Oh Lucy! – a middle-aged office lady gets a new lease on life after an eccentric English teacher gives her a blonde wig and rechristens her “Lucy”. Review.
Outrage Coda – Takashi Miike closes out the Outrage trilogy.
Pumpkin and Mayonnaise – Tsuchida works as a hostess to support her aspiring musician boyfriend but her life is derailed when he finds out about the nature of her work while the resurfacing of an ex-lover also awakens long buried feelings.
Recall – A corporate scandal is exposed when an innocent woman is killed by a tire flying off a truck.
River’s Edge – A gay student bullied by his classmates discovers a dead body near a polluted river and shows it to his best friend in Isao Yukisada’s adaptation of the classic ’90s manga.
Blue Film Woman – a young woman attempts to blackmail the corrupt banker responsible for the deaths of her parents in Ken Mukai’s pink film from 1969.
Vibrator – a 30-something freelance writer embarks on a journey of self discovery after a chance meeting with a truck driver in Ryuichi Hiroki’s 2003 adaptation of Mari Akasaka’s novel
The Third Murder – Hirokazu Koreeda puts justice on trial in a tense courtroom drama in which a once convicted murderer pleads guilty to a second crime while his cynical lawyer becomes ever more uncertain his client is telling the truth. Review.
Tremble All You Want – a painfully shy woman with a long standing unrequited crush on a high school classmate reaches a crisis point when a bashful colleague confesses his love for her. Review.
We Are – coming of age story in which seven friends part ways after high school some heading to Tokyo some staying behind but their paths always crossing.

Nippon Visions

Breath of Rokkasho – childhood friends and former political activists are forced to question their ideals.
Cyclops – A man wrongfully incarcerated for the murder of his wife decides to look for the real killer alongside the policeman riddled with regret that he helped frame an innocent man.
The Hungry Lion – When a teacher is arrested for an inappropriate relationship with a minor, a video circulates online depicting him with another girl. As the girl rumoured to be on the tape, Hiromi’s life spirals out of control.
Ice Cream and the Sound of Raindrops – Shot in one 74 minute continuous take, Daigo Matsui’s drama follows six teens auditioning for a local theatre production.
The Name – A depressed former salaryman leading a series of double lives is given a sense of new possibilities by the appearance of a mysterious high school girl. Review.
The Night I Swam – A sleepy little boy goes on a snowy adventure in this magical, dialogue free odyssey. Review.
Noise – A stabbing spree in Akihabara continues to reverberate 10 years later in Yusaku Matsumoto’s debut feature. Review.
One Cut of the Dead – Real zombies invade the set of a horror movie in Shinichiro Ueda’s hilarious behind the scenes farce. Review.
Party ‘Round the Globe – Hirobumi Watanabe returns with another deadpan classic in which he stars as a lonely man on a roadtrip with a neighbour.
Passage of Life – an undocumented Burmese family living in Tokyo face intense pressure because of their precarious status.
Strange Fruit: Shorts – three short films by Kohei Nakayama, Noriko Yuasa, and Tetsuhiko Tsuchiya.
Topknot Detective – Australian mockumentary examining the creation of the titular TV series.
Wilderness – two men bond in the boxing ring in Yoshiyuki Kishi’s adaptation of the novel by Shuji Terayama.

Nippon Animation

Lu Over the Wall – A young man with musical dreams makes friends with a music loving mermaid and saves his town in the process. Review.
Mary and the Witch’s Flower – A lonely young girl gets magical powers for one day only in the first feature from Studio Ponoc – German sub/live dub only. Review.
Music of the Virtual World: Japanese Indie Animated Shorts – collection of animated shorts curated by Dr. Catherine Munroe Hotes.
Mutafukaz – anarchic French/Japanese co-production in which a motorcyclist finds himself plagued by strange visions. French with German subtitles.
The Night is Short, Walk on Girl – a lovestruck student chases a mysterious girl around nighttime Kyoto. Review.
The Boy and the Beast – an orphaned boy living on the streets slips into a fantasy world in Mamoru Hosoda’s 2015 feature. Japanese audio with German subtitles only.
Tokyo University of the Arts: Animation – short films completed by graduate students at the Institute for Animated Film in Yokohama.
Violence Voyager – indie animation from Uchija in which two boys chance upon a mysterious theme park.

Nippon Docs

Danchi Woman – Akiko Sugimoto follows an 85-year-old woman who has been living in a danchi for over 30 years only to face upheaval when the estate is scheduled for demolition.
Exclusive Screening by NHK World-Japan – showcase of three NHK docs featuring traditional subjects including tea ceremony and ninjas, plus the docudrama following the life of Hokusai’s daughter Oei starring Aoi Miyazaki and Ryuhei Matsuda.
A Free Man – Andreas Hartmann follows a young man wilfully living on the streets to pursue a life of freedom.
Inland Sea – Kazuhiro Soda explores a traditional fishing village slowly dying out due to depopulation.
Japan Institute of the Moving Image: Short Docs – two documentary shorts focussing on the 2008 Akihabara attack and a young man who wanders the streets doing odd jobs.
Love and Walbachia – Sayaka Ono considers the interplay between love and gender.
Of Love and Law – Hikaru Toda reunites with Kazu and Fumi as they fight tirelessly to win recognition for those underrepresented in Japan’s conformist society. Review.
Ramen Heads – Koki Shigeno follows ramen chef Osamu Tomita.
Trace of Breath – Haruka Komori captures the life around a small garden centre in a town which was heavily affected by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
Zen and Bones – Takayuki Nakamura tells the amazing story behind Japanese/American monk Henry Mittwer.

Nippon Retro

Kiru – Also known as Destiny’s Son, Kenji Misumi’s Kiru is the story of a young boy who trains to become a skilled swordsman and then sets out on a journey to learn the secrets of his past.
On the Road Forever – sequel to Kiru in which the hero tracks down a man who may have been involved with the death of his father.
Red Peony Gambles Her Life – first instalment in the Red Peony series in which Junko Fuji plays female gambler Oryu.
Samurai Rebellion – a model samurai (Toshiro Mifune) decides he’s had enough of feudalism when his son is force married to the lord’s cast off only to have her called back once he’s fallen in love with her in Masaki Kobayashi’s enraged drama. Review.
Sanjuro – sequel to Yojimbo in which Mifune reassumes the role of the wandering hero to fight corruption.
Kurama Tengu – Screening of the 1928 silent film with benshi accompaniment. German subtitles only.
Sword of Doom – Tatsuya Nakadai stars as Kihachi Okamoto’s nihilistic swordsman.
Thirteen Assassins – remade by Takashi Miike in 2010, 13 Assassins follows the plot to take down a corrupt lord who raped a woman and murdered her husband but got away with it because of his connections.
Yojimbo – Kurosawa’s classic in which wandering ronin Sanjuro comes to the rescue of a town caught up in a gang war.

Nippon Connection takes place in Frankfurt, Germany from 29th May to 3rd June. Tickets are already on sale via the official website where you can also find full details on all the films as well as timetabling information. Unless otherwise stated, films screen in Japanese with English subtitles. In addition to the films the festival will also host a series of events including director talks and workshops in a rich cultural programme. You can keep up with all the latest information by following the festival on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, and Instagram.

Alifu, the Prince/ss (阿莉芙, Wang Yu-lin, 2017)

May 7, 2018July 21, 2019by Hayley Scanlon1 Comment

Among Asian nations, Taiwan has a reputation for being liberal and permissive but if you’re a minority within a minority life is far from easy even if you manage to find support from others in a similar position. So it is for Alifu (Utjung Tjakivalid) – the conflicted soul at the centre of Wang Yu-lin’s nuanced depiction of the road towards self acceptance and actualisation in the face of competing duties and obligations, Alifu, the Prince/ss (阿莉芙, Ālìfú). While Alifu struggles with the demands of being the heir to the Chieftainship of an indigenous tribe with all the rights and obligations that entails, her lesbian roommate struggles with a bad breakup and growing feelings for her transitioning best friend, a drag queen is conflicted about his sexuality, and a transgender bar owner worries for the future of those close to her after she is diagnosed with a terminal illness. Despite the multitude of difficult circumstances, each attempts to deal with their problems in a mature and rational fashion finding love and mutual support from their friends and community even if others sometimes require a little more time.

Alifu, born the son of a tribal chief, identifies as a woman and has been working in a hairdressers in the city to save up for gender reassignment surgery. Her plans for the future are thrown into disarray when she is abruptly called home, walking into a family meeting during which her father (Ara Kimbo) suddenly announces that he is stepping down because of poor health and that his son will be taking over. Though it is possible for a woman to succeed as chief, Alifu has not disclosed her intentions to transition to her traditionally minded father who wears a prominent wooden cross around his neck and does not seem to be particularly understanding of his child’s feelings or emotions, caring only for his appearance in the eyes of the tribe.

Alifu’s transition is subtly revealed in the lengthy opening in which she slowly sheds her “masculine” appearance by discarding her baseball cap, rearranging her hair and stepping into the ladies loos where she puts on colourful lipstick and hoop earrings before making her way to the hairdressers where she earns her living. Meanwhile, her lesbian roommate Pei-Zhen (Chao Yi-Lan) thinks nothing of leaving the house dressed in a way which best makes her feel comfortable only to cause a mini ruckus in the salon when her ex gives her the side-eye for openly flirting with another client apparently after “something special”. After hours, Alifu picks up extra money by doing hair and makeup for the drag acts at a local gay bar where she has also drawn close to the owner, Sherry (Bamboo Chen), who is in a long-term though apparently non-sexual relationship with a former gangster (Wu Pong-fong).

Alifu soon develops a liking for a new drag act at the bar, describing him as somehow “not like the others”. Chris (Cheng Jen-shuo), a local government worker, is a mild mannered sort apparently happily married to a piano teacher (Angie Wang) and living a conventional middle-class life, except that he likes to stay out late on Fridays performing at Sherry’s drag bar. Though it would be a mistake to assume Chris is gay just because he enjoys drag, his “secret life” eventually places a wedge between himself and his wife who is hurt to find out about his alter-ego through a third party. Chris’ wife doesn’t necessarily disapprove of his drag career but is disturbed to discover such a big secret in her married life and, understandably, has a lot of questions about the status of their relationship – something Chris isn’t keen on talking about leading to his wife finally throwing him out. Struggling to reconcile his drag persona with his need for a conventional life, Chris finds himself exiled and unable to integrate himself fully as whole person, torn between his conflicting desires.

Meanwhile, Alifu’s ever supportive best friend Pei-Zhen has begun to develop feelings for her roommate despite the fact that Alifu has no interest in women and Pei-Zhen is a lesbian with no previous interest in male genitals. Seducing her, Pei-Zhen reassures Alifu that male or female she will always love her – something which becomes a minor theme in arguing for fluidity and self identification over culturally defined notions of gender, echoed in the relationship of Sherry and her partner which seems to be deep and loving but also celibate. Perhaps overly convenient, the union of Alifu and Pei-Zhen does at least provide an opportunity to experience the best of both worlds in allowing Alifu to fulfil her obligations to her tribe while also living an authentic life as a transgender woman.

Warm and filled with a particularly Taiwanese brand of humour, Alifu is a sympathetic exploration of life on the margins, both from the perspectives of the LGBT community and that of the indigenous peoples attempting to preserve their traditional culture whilst acknowledging their place in the modern world. Arriving at an important moment, Wang Yu-lin’s empathetic drama is a celebration of love and equality but most of all of the power of self-acceptance and actualisation in bringing about real social change.

Screened as part of the Chinese Visual Festival 2018.

Original trailer (English subtitles)

Somewhere Beyond the Mist (藍天白雲, Cheung King-wai, 2017)

May 6, 2018July 21, 2019by Hayley ScanlonLeave a comment

Cheung King-wai, making his narrative feature debut, opens with a quote from Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov to the effect that people, even bad people, are often far more innocent and pure-hearted than most realise, including we ourselves. The quote, overlaid above the vision of the city at night glowing red like dying furnace, introduces us to the story we are about to hear – one which is dark, too dark perhaps to imagine, but then again all too real. Caught in the twilight half light, Hong Kong is fiery cauldron of hell, yet when the sun rises and the mist rolls in, it’s hard to see what the night made so terrible.

As if to underline the confusion, we begin with a lost old man who is desperately searching either for a way in or a way out. His housekeeper eventually comes to find him and bring him home and we discover he is the father of one of our heroines, Angela (Stephy Tang Lai-yan) – a police detective expecting her first child. Angela’s father, Dr. Ho, is suffering from advanced dementia which is beginning to take its toll on Angela’s home life even if she leaves most of the responsibility to her compassionate husband, Tony.

Meanwhile, the bodies of a middle-aged couple have been discovered at a reservoir. The police set about looking for the couple’s missing daughter, Connie (Rachel Leung Yung-ting), only to find her holed up in the mountains with her best friend Eric (Zeno Koo Ting-hin). Connie reacts with eerie calm when informed of the deaths of her parents, merely repeating that she was already aware before agreeing to accompany the police to the station where she, matter of factly, confesses to having been the one who murdered them.

Cheung’s intention is not to create a murder mystery, Connie freely confesses her crime and isn’t particularly interested in explanations or justifications (though as it turns out, she would have plenty). He is much more interested in the examining the society which made such an “unthinkable” crime possible, exposing the dark heart of an increasingly confused city which finds itself pulled in two directions by various political anxieties.

Back with the original image of the city as a pit of hell, each of our protagonists becomes a link in a circular chain of violence, turning their own feelings of oppression, marginalisation, and despair back on their fellow suffers. Connie, as we find out, comes from an extremely dysfunctional home in which her truck driver father lists small time pimping among his “hobbies”, openly masturbates while watching hardcore Japanese pornography in the family living room only enjoying it more for the thought of taunting his teenage daughter, rapes the family’s disabled mother, and seemingly ignores his grown up son. Catching Connie’s friend Eric hiding in a cupboard in her room, he assumes the pair are up to no good and drags the boy out to viciously beat him with his belt just to remind him who it is that is boss around here, pausing only to remind Connie that “a virgin pussy” is worth more money and if she’s that desperate he can find her a client to satisfy both their needs.

Strangely enough, Eric does not completely object to the beating. He sees it as a sign of validation. Like Connie, Eric is also a lonely, marginalised figure but in his case because he is gay and desperately wants not to be. Being mistaken for Connie’s boyfriend is, in his eyes, a kind of proof of his “manhood” and so it’s a beating he is almost grateful to receive unlike those from his schoolmates who taunt him with broom handles and scream homophobic slurs which only add to his feelings of extreme worthlessness. Eric wanted to be friends with Connie to escape both suspicion and loneliness, but she, in a cutting moment of despair, also uses his insecurity over his sexuality and feelings of inadequacy as a “man” against him to get him to help with her plan to free herself of parental tyranny. Connie hates bullies, but she hates people who don’t stand up to them more. Thus she becomes the gentle defender of another marginalised figure – Jessica, an Indian girl who is targeted because she wears trousers under her school skirt, constantly assailed with slurs about “stinky” curry and various other stereotypical insults that leave her in tears.

Eric points out that his beating at the hands of Connie’s father didn’t bother him because it was “understandable” – a father finds a boy hiding in his daughter’s room and chases him out. The logic is sound, it’s a story you’ve heard before – not like the senseless acts of violence which surround him every day and cannot be explained. Connie’s crime too seems “understandable” given all she’s suffered, a precaution taken to save her from a still more terrible fate she feared might soon come her way. This is the uncomfortable realisation with which Angela is faced during her investigation, forcing her to confront her own difficult relationship with her apparently tyrannical father who made her mother’s life a misery. Angela has to accept that she could easily have been Connie, or Connie her, though she ultimately made the (still taboo) decision to place her father into a home rather than continue to look after him herself. Tube fed and alone, Angela’s father is utterly powerless but however much she wishes she could abandon him she continues to visit even if her resentment is plain. Then again, if a parent breaks the contract first in failing to care for their child in infancy, should the child still be expected to care for them when they are old? Perhaps they owe each other nothing other than civility and an attempt at forgiveness.

Asked why she ran to the mountains, Connie replies that she went to live “the life I deserve”. Dreaming of a world “beyond the mist”, free from the city’s confusion and the constant stream of violence passing from one lonely soul to another, Connie transgressed in order to free herself but has only found greater imprisonment and ongoing mental torment. Beautifully photographed, Cheung’s narrative debut is a bleak and gloomy affair but somehow maintains its belief in a better place Somewhere Beyond the Mist even if it continues to elude us.

Screened as part of the Chinese Visual Festival 2018.

Original trailer (English subtitles)

Soundless Wind Chime (無聲風鈴, Kit Hung, 2009)

May 5, 2018July 21, 2019by Hayley ScanlonLeave a comment

Two transients find love in the crowded streets of Hong Kong, only to lose it again and long for its return. Deliberately obscure, Kit Hung’s debut Soundless Wind Chime (無聲風鈴, Wúshēng Fēng Líng) is an elegy for lost love, a poetic meditation on the power of memory and a treatise on the art of letting go. Though the lovers manage to construct a world for themselves shielded from the external chaos, its shell gradually fractures under the pressure of real world concerns until tragedy finally intervenes and shatters it forever.

Ricky (Lu Yulai), a mainlander recently arrived in Hong Kong, lives with an aunt (Wella Zhang) who makes a living through prostitution, while he makes ends meet as a delivery boy at neighbourhood eatery. One day, he pauses on the job to watch a foreign juggler (Hannes Lindenblatt) at which point his wallet is stolen by a foreign pickpocket who we later learn to be a German speaking Swiss man named Pascal (Bernhard Bulling). Pascal is currently in an abusive relationship with the juggler whose act is a set up to attract a crowd so that Pascal can rob the captivated spectators. After being beaten up and then brutally raped by his boyfriend, Pascal ups and leaves, eking out a living through juggling on the streets. Arriving at Ricky’s restaurant, he gives him his wallet (and ID card) back and the two strike up a friendship that soon becomes more, living together first at Ricky’s aunt’s and then getting their own place where they can truly be themselves.

To begin with the relationship is a rather happy and open one. Though Ricky decides to leave his aunt’s place immediately after she figures out that he is gay and in a relationship with Pascal, she does not disapprove of his sexuality and only stops to warn him not to invite his ailing mother to Hong Kong because she doesn’t know what the fallout will be from realising her sister is a prostitute and her son is gay all at the same time. Likewise, the lively ladies at the restaurant all seem fairly accepting (or perhaps just oblivious) of Ricky’s relationship with Pascal, impressed by his juggling skill and including him in their after hours mahjong games. The young couple do however have their differences, notably in Pascal’s self destructive streak which sends him back into Hong Kong’s gay nightlife scene while Ricky would rather just spend time home alone together.

The disjointed, non-linear narrative opens in the middle with Ricky making his way to Switzerland in search of Pascal, in a spiritual more than literal sense. Whilst there he runs into another man, Ueli, who looks exactly like Pascal even if he is nothing like him in spirit. The film’s title is inspired by the Chinese belief that a soul lingers after it leaves the body, attaching itself to an animal in order to stay longer and make its last goodbyes. Traditionally, a wind chime is though to reveal the presence of spirits, and it is this Ricky has come looking for as the wind chime outside Ueli’s antique shop gleefully trembles as if it were pleased to see him.

Ricky’s memories spiral away from him as snow covered Switzerland echoes sunny Hong Kong, each thought and action recalling some part of his life with Pascal while he grows closer to the wounded, grieving Ueli whom he believes, on some level, to be Pascal returned to him in another form. Later, Hung shifts the action to the Mainland where Ricky has returned to look after his dying mother, working as a taxi driver to make ends meet. Unable to find Pascal, uncertain whether his soul has flown to Hong Kong where they made their home or the place where he was born, Ricky has himself returned to source and prompted Ueli to make his journey in reverse, bringing him news of Pascal but also perhaps promising an end rather than a beginning.

Hung wears his influences on his sleeves – his style owes much to Wong Kai-Wai but more particularly to Tsai Ming-Liang as his frequent forays into surrealistic musical interludes make plain. Yet his narrative is confused and overly impressionistic, withholding essential pieces of information which would make sense of the more obscure elements such as the lost luggage receipt Ricky takes with him to Switzerland and the contents of the bag he ultimately obtains. Deeply melancholic and filled with a wistful sense of longing – the soundless wind chime of the title lying silent yet attentive, Hung’s dreamlike debut is a strangely affecting exploration of grief and transience as his hero learns how to live after love, abandoning his pain to realms of nostalgia and rediscovering the peaceful emptiness of ordinary silence.

Screened as part of the Chinese Visual Festival 2018.

Original trailer (English subtitles)

Inuyashiki (いぬやしき, Shinsuke Sato, 2018)

May 4, 2018July 16, 2018by Hayley Scanlon8 Comments

Japanese cinema has long been preoccupied by the conflict between age and youth though it usually comes down on the side of the youngsters, even when rebuking them for their selfish immorality. Inuyashiki (いぬやしき), adapted from the manga by Hiroya Oku, is similarly understanding but makes a hero of its sad dad protagonist whose adult life has been a socially acceptable disaster, while finding sympathy for his villainous teenage counterpart who resents his lack of possibilities in an already unfair world.

Unsuccessful salaryman Inuyashiki (Noritake Kinashi) has just moved into a new house of which he is very proud but his wife (Mari Hamada) and children find small and old fashioned. He’s bought sushi to celebrate the occasion, but the other family members ignore him and head out for dinner on their own. Held in contempt at home, Inuyashiki’s working life is also something of a disaster in which he is publicly berated by his boss who threatens to fire him, leaving Inuyashiki kneeling in supplication just to be allowed to work until retirement so he can keep up the mortgage payments on that new house (which he bought for his family who all hate him).

To make matters worse, Inuyashiki has also just received the news that he is suffering from terminal cancer and has only a few months to live. His only ray of sunshine appears when he finds an abandoned dog, Hanako, and decides to adopt her but his wife orders him to throw the dog out in case it messes up the house (that she already hates). Sadly walking Hanako to the park with the intention of sending her on her way, Inuyashiki is struck by a mysterious blast and later wakes up to discover he has become an all powerful cyborg with booster rockets on his back and guns in his arms.

Inuyashiki’s first instinct is that he can use his new found powers to save people. Contemplating his mortality, Inuyashiki was made to feel that his life had been a failure; he’d never done anything of consequence and had never been able to protect anyone. Reviving a wounded bird in the street, he realises he has the power to heal along with super sensitive hearing which allows him to hear the cries of those in peril.

Meanwhile, the teenager caught in the same blast, Shishigami (Takeru Satoh), is heading in the opposite direction. Shishigami is also filled with resentment though mostly as regards his poverty and comparative lack of possibilities. He hates that his single-mother (Yuki Saito) has to work herself to the bone because his father (Kiyohiko Shibukawa) left the family for another woman with whom he has built another home and become extremely wealthy. He hates that his video game otaku friend (Kanata Hongo) is mercilessly bullied and has stopped coming to school altogether rather than fight back. Filled with a young man’s rage and a mild kind of psychopathy, Shishigami doesn’t see why it’s wrong to become a bully rather than fighting them. Frustrated beyond reason he declares war on an uncaring society and sentences everyone in Japan to death for their indifference to their fellow citizens.

The conflict between the angel and the devil concludes in predictably bombastic fashion as our two cyborgs go head to head in a climactic battle for the soul of Japan. Strangely enough both men are motivated by love even if one’s actions are darker than the other’s. Inuyashiki wants to protect, to be someone his family can respect and depend on – he flees the scenes of his miracles because he isn’t interested in being a “hero”, just in being of use. Shishigami, by contrast, is motivated by love for his mother whose continuing suffering proves too much for him to bear though his attempts to take revenge only end in more tragedy. Mustering all the technology of the age from smartphones to live broadcasts, Shishigami makes himself a familiar face on TV sets and LCD screens across the country to preach his message of hate as a declaration of war.

Shishigami proclaims that Inuyashiki’s sense of justice is no match for his hate, but there is a definite irony in the squaring off of two men from different generations trying to figure out their differences by pounding the living hell out of each other and destroying half of Tokyo in the process. Still, that is in many ways the point as these two “gods” actively choose the sides of light and darkness, vying for the right to rule the future as forces of destruction or salvation.

Screened at the 20th Udine Far East Film Festival.

Original trailer (English subtitles)

The Blood of Wolves (孤狼の血, Kazuya Shiraishi, 2018)

May 3, 2018June 22, 2018by Hayley Scanlon10 Comments

Japanese cinema, like American cinema, is one of the few in which the hero cop is a recognisable trope. Though they may be bumbling, inefficient, obsessed with bureaucracy, or perhaps just lazy, police in Japanese cinema are rarely corrupt or actively engaged in criminality. Even within the realms of the “jitsuroku” gangster movie, the police maintain a fringe presence, permitting the existence of the underground crime world in order to contain it. “Jitsuroku” is, in a fashion, where we find ourselves with Kazuya Shiraishi’s throwback underworld police story, The Blood of Wolves (孤狼の血, Koro no Chi). Set in 1988, the end of the Showa Era which had seen the rebirth of post-war Japan and the ascendency of yakuza thuggery, The Blood of Wolves is based on a novel by Yuko Yuzuki rather than a “true account” of life on the frontlines of gangsterdom, but otherwise draws inspiration from the Battles Without Honour series in updating the story of nihilistic yakuza violence to the bubble era.

In 1988, a young accountant “goes missing” sending his sister to ask the police for help in locating him. The case gets passed to sleazy detective Ogami (Koji Yakusho) and his new rookie partner, Hioka (Tori Matsuzaka). Ogami leers disturbingly at the dame who just walked into his office before dismissing the newbie and extracting a sexual favour from the distressed relative of the missing man. Unfortunately, the accountant turns up dead and the bank he worked for turns out to be a yakuza front caught up in a burgeoning gang war between the Odani with whom Ogami has long standing connections and the gang from the next town over who are looking to increase their territory.

Ogami, a chain smoking, hard drinking, womanising detective of the old school, has one foot in the yakuza world and the other on the side of law enforcement. Hioka, a recent graduate from the local but also elite Hiroshima University (something of a rarity in his current occupation), is not quite sure what to make of his new boss and his decidedly “unorthodox” methods, becoming increasingly concerned about the way the police force operates in a town defined by organised crime. Deciding that Ogami has gone too far, he eventually makes the decision to go to IA with a list of complaints but there’s still so much he doesn’t know about Hiroshima and it is possible he may have picked the wrong side.

What he discovers is that the police force is so intrinsically rotten as to have become little more than a yakuza gang itself, only one with the legal right to carry guns and a more impressive uniform. Ogami, for all his faults, apparently has his heart in the right place. His “friendships” with gangsters are more means to an end than they are spiritual corruption, gaining leverage that will help him keep a lid on gang war – after all, no one wants a return to the turbulent days of the 1970s when the streets ran red with the blood of unlucky foot soldiers and that of the civilians who got in their way. Meanwhile Hioka, starting out as the straight-laced rookie, is himself “corrupted” by the corruption he uncovers, developing a complex mix of disgust and admiration for Ogami’s practiced methods of manipulation which, apparently, place public safety above all else.

Ogami, as he tells the conflicted Hioka, knows he walks a tightrope every day, neatly straddling the line between cop and yakuza, and the only way to stay alive is to keep on walking knowing one slip may lead to his doom. He may say cops can do whatever they like in pursuit of “justice” (and he does), but Ogami has his lines that cannot be crossed, unlike others in his organisation who care only for themselves and have long since given up any pretence of working for the public good.

Shiraishi channels classic Fukasaku from the noticeably retro Toei logo at the film’s opening to the voice over narration, garish red on screen text, and frequent use of freeze frames familiar from the Battles Without Honour series and associated “jitsuroku” gangster fare that followed in its wake. Moving the action up to 1988, the gangster world is once again in flux as it tries to corporatise itself to get in on the profits of bubble era prosperity which largely has no need for the thuggish gangster antics of the chaotic post-war years in which the yakuza could paint itself as a defender of the poor and oppressed no matter how ridiculous it might have been in reality. Ogami is a dying breed, a relic of the Showa era meeting its natural end, but perhaps you need to be a wolf to catch a wolf and guardian spirits can come in unexpected forms.

Screened at the 20th Udine Far East Film Festival.

Original trailer (English subtitles)