Author: Hayley Scanlon

Mumon: The Land of Stealth To Open Japan Cuts 2017

June 11, 2017by Hayley ScanlonLeave a comment

Mumon Now in its 11th year, Japan Cuts returns to Japan Society New York from 13th to 23rd July bringing some of the best in recent Japanese cinema with it as well as a host of special guests and events. The festival will open with Yoshihiro Nakamura’s ninja drama, Mumon: The Land on Stealth on 13th July while award-winning animation In This Corner of the World will close the proceedings on July 23. The full lineup is as follows:

mumon still Yoshihiro Nakamura’s ninja epic Mumon: The Land of Stealth finds the secretive warriors uncomfortable with the new order but young mercenary Mumon has his own problems with a new wife who values her material comforts. Director Yoshihiro Nakamura will be present on the opening night to present the film.

Tokyo Idols still Kyoko Miyake’s documentary Tokyo Idols follows an aspiring star as she makes her way through one of the most controversial areas of the Japanese entertainment industry.

Taking inspiration from the poetry of Tahi Saihate, The Tokyo Night Sky is Always the Densest Shade of Blue is a complicated love/hate letter to the city from The Great Passage’s Yuya Ishii. Review.

satoshi still Kenichi Matsuyama stars in a moving biopic of the real life shoji star who gave it all for the game in Satoshi: A Move for Tomorrow. Review.

hengyo still The latest film from Okinawan filmmaker Go Takamine, Hengyoro (Queer Fish Lane) follows two old men living in the village where those who failed to die continue to exist as they set off on a strange journey to escape persecution after being falsely accused of stealing something from a local store.

alley cat still Yosuke Kubozuka plays a depressed boxer who finds friendship in the Alley Cat of the title only to realise he’s being two-timed with a grungy mechanic.

tale of a whale Megumi Sasaki’s documentary A Whale of a Tale takes an in-depth look at the controversial practice of whaling.

22 year confession still Tetsuya Fujiwara and Hideaki Ito star in Memoirs of a Murderer – an adaptation of Jung Byoung-Gil’s Confession of Murder directed by Yu Irie. A mysterious man confesses to a series of unsolved crimes shortly after the statute of limitations passes and becomes a media sensation but the cop who failed to solve the case just can’t let it go.

neko assume house still Based on the hit smartphone game Neko Atsume House stars Atsushi Ito as a blocked writer who moves to the country hoping to stimulate himself with a change of scene only to be immediately adopted by a bunch of demanding cats!

Tai Kato’s underseen documentary The Ondekoza plays in the classic strand in its new 4K restoration and centres on the taiko drummers of Sado Island, mixing training footage with their famously intense performances for a feverish visual feast.

LOVE AND GOODBYE AND HAWAII still Shingo Matsumura’s gentle Love, Goodbye, and Hawaii is the story of a technically broken up couple who still live together and are forced to face their lingering feelings when one of them meets someone else.

At the terrace テラスにて Kenji Yamauchi adapts his own stage play skewering the middle classes as a boring dinner party gets progressively out of hand exposing each of their flaws, weaknesses, and well hidden secrets in At the Terrace. Review.

Produced by Shinji Aoyama and Takenori Sento, Sora Hokimoto’s debut feature Haruneko is a tale of life and death told through music and light in a mysterious forest.

oce upon a dream still Kei Shichiri revisits Before the Day Breaks ten years on and adds all-new sound and imaging. Based on the manga by Naoki Yamamoto, Once Upon a Dream follows a girl who sleeps too much but never feels as if she has slept enough.

daguerrotype still The first film made outside of Japan for veteran filmmaker Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Daguerrotype stars Tahar Rahim in a classic European gothic ghost story perfectly melding this classic genre with Kurosawa’s uniquely creepy visuals.

RESISTANCE AT TULE LAKE still Konrad Aderer’s documentary Resistance at Tulle Lake tells the story of 12000 Japanese Americans labelled “disloyal” and incarcerated at the Tule Lake Segregation Center for refusing to obey the government’s internment order.

extremeists Opera still Theatre director Junko Emoto makes her film debut with The Extremists’ Opera adapted from her own autobiographical novel centring on an all female performance troupe.

over the fence still 1 The third in a series of films adapted from the works of Hakodate native novelist Yasushi Sato, Nobuhiro Yamashita’s Over the Fence stars Joe Odagiri as a recently divorced man returning to his home town to start over but failing until he meets eccentric bar girl/zookeeper Satoshi played Yu Aoi. Joe Odagiri is a special guest at this year’s festival and will be attending in person to introduce the film as well as collect this year’s CUT ABOVE award.

FOUJITA Joe Odagiri stars as the artist Léonard Tsuguharu Foujita who became a part of the ’20s Paris art scene before returning to militarist Japan in 1933 and providing artwork for the propaganda movement. Joe Odagiri will also attend in person for an introduction and Q&A.

teiichi still Elite public school boy Teiichi dreams of becoming Prime Minister in Akira Nagai’s manga adaptation, Teiichi Battle of Supreme High but finds his (lack of) ideology questioned by a well meaning working class transfer student. Review.

shippu rondo horizontal An adaptation of Keigo Higashino’s 2013 novel, Shippu Rondo sees Hiroshi Abe play a research scientist hot on the trail of a stolen biological weapon in a slapstick filled comedy thriller.

senjoe e The Japan Cuts 2017 Shorts Showcase features four films by veteran and brand new filmmakers including:

Birds – Directed by Koji Fukada this 8 minute short features an awkward encounter between a wife, her husband, and his mistress.
We Are Shooting – Raita Minorita’s 26 minute short is a behind the scenes tale of the trials and tribulations of movie making.
White T-shirt and Feeble Things – directed by Yun Su Kim, White T-shirt and Feeble Things is the story of a man who only wears plain white T-shirts but can’t keep any of them clean.
Breathless Lovers – Directed by Shumpei Shimizu Breathless Lovers is the story of 23-year-old Toshiyuki chasing his boyfriend’s ghost across Tokyo.

west north west 2 An Iranian student and depressed bartender face a series of romantic and cross cultural confusions in Takuro Nakamura’s West North West. Actresses Hanae Kan and Sahel Rosa will attend the screening for an introduction and Q&A. Review.

yamato california still Depressed teenager Sakura (Hanae Kan) has a complicated relationship with Americanisation thanks to growing up near Japan’s biggest mainland American military base but an encounter with the half-American daughter of her mother’s boyfriend prompts a reconsideration of her life goals in Daisuke Miyazaki’s Yamato (California). Review.

Anti-porno still Sion Sono’s entry into Nikkatsu’s Roman Porno Reboot Project, Anti-Porno is the story of celebrity novelist Kyoko and her strange relationship with her assistant Noriko.

dad and mr ito still The latest film from Yuki Tanada, My Dad and Mr. Ito, is a tale of cross-cultural romance as an elderly father moves in with his middle-aged daughter only to find she is already living with a much older man.

summer nights Summer Lights marks the Japan debut for French filmmaker Jean-Gabriel Périot. A Japanese filmmaker living in Paris returns to Japan in order to make a documentary about Hiroshima and ends up on a journey with a mysterious woman.

The first in the Taisho Trilogy, Zigeunerweisen is a late career masterpiece from Seijun Suzuki centring on a university professor’s odd relationship with a roguish friend and a mysterious geisha. Review.

in this corner of the world horizontal Sunao Katabuchi’s award-winning animation In This Corner of the World is the story of one ordinary woman in World War II Hiroshima. Producer Taro Maki will be present for a Q&A after the film.

Japan Cuts takes place at Japan Society New York, from July 13 – 23, 2017. Ticket links and full details for all the films can be found on the festival’s official website, and you can keep up with all the latest news as well as the year round film programme via the Japan Society Film Facebook page and Twitter account. Tickets are already on sale to members with public sales available 12th June.

Hime-anole (ヒメアノ～ル, Keisuke Yoshida, 2016)

June 11, 2017by Hayley Scanlon1 Comment

hime-anole poster Some people are odd, and that’s OK. Then there are the people who are odd, but definitely not OK. Hime-anole (ヒメアノ～ル) introduces us to both of these kinds of outsiders, attempting to draw a line between the merely awkward and the actively dangerous but ultimately finding that there is no line and perhaps simple acts of kindness offered at the right time could have prevented a mind snapping or a person descending into spiralling homicidal delusion. To go any further is to say too much, but Hime-anole revels in its reversals, switching rapidly between quirky romantic comedy, gritty Japanese indie, and finally grim social horror. Yet it plants its seeds early with two young men struggling to express their true emotions, trapped and lonely, leading unfulfilling lives. Their dissatisfaction is ordinary, but these same repressed emotions taken to an extreme can produce much more harmful results than two guys eating stale donuts everyday just to ask a pretty girl for the bill.

Okada (Gaku Hamada) is a young man lost. He has a dead end construction job he doesn’t like and isn’t particularly good at, but treading cement all over the finished floors at least helps him bond with his mentor, Ando (Tsuyoshi Muro), who seems to view him as a friend even if constantly referring to him as “Okamura”. Okada takes the opportunity to explain his malaise to Ando – that he feels his life slipping away from him in its emptiness, going through the motions with no real hobbies or girlfriend to give his existence meaning. Ando does not really understand this, he says dissatisfaction is natural and the driving force of all life but, on the other hand, he is not particularly dissatisfied because he lives for love!

Ando has a crush on a girl at the local cafe, Yuka (Aimi Satsukawa), who actually hasn’t noticed him because she’s pre-occupied with the blond guy who got there before Ando and sits outside everyday just staring at her. Luckily or unluckily, the guy in question, Morita (Go Morita), is an old high school acquaintance of Okada’s and so Ando asks him to find out what’s going on with this scary looking guy and his angelic lady love.

So far, so Japanese indie rom-com, but when the title card flashes up about a third of the way in, we’re in very different territory. Suddenly the colour drains from the screen and Yoshida changes his aesthetic and shooting style almost entirely. Gone is the comforting, slightly washed out colour scheme and the static, middle-distance camera of the opening. Now we are the voyeur, held helpless behind Yoshida’s erratic shaky cam, hiding behind the bins as Morita goes about his bloody business. Morita’s world is dark yet realistic, he’s shot and positioned with the arch naturalism familiar to the Japanese indie and the violence he inflicts is not movie violence, it is shocking, sickening, and visceral.

Hime-anole does not shy away from the consequences of its actions. This is, in a way, its point. At one time or another everyone concludes the increasingly surreal events they become engulfed in must be all their fault because they all have at some point acted in a way they do not quite approve of. Guilt is another of the emotions that is hard to express, especially when it’s mixed with humiliation or fear, but left unaddressed it is these corrosive agonies which develop into deep psychoses. Morita, a violent sociopath, was once (or so it would seem) an ordinary young boy who liked video games and had few friends. Perhaps if he hadn’t been the victim of humiliating, sadistic treatment, or if someone had found the courage to stand up for him, none of this might be happening.

Then again, the world is a strange place filled with people who have trouble deciding where the lines are when it comes to appropriate behaviour. Poor Yuka seems to have become something of a nutter magnet, stalked by two guys at the same time and chatted up in the street by persistent suitors who only leave her alone when they realise she’s waiting for another man. Okada is the only man who’s treated her like a regular human being for a very long time so it’s no surprise that she begins to prefer him to his awkward friend. Ando is, it has to be said, odd. Convinced Yuka is the one for him yet completely uninterested in her feelings, he vows to persevere. Yet for all his talk of chainsaws, Ando is basically harmless (to others at least) and just another lonely guy who doesn’t know how to express himself in way in which he will be understood. Morita, by contrast, is instantly creepy and has no interest in connection, he only wants to take and possess in a kind of ongoing vengeance for truly horrific events in his childhood following which something inside him became very broken.

That Hime-anole ends with a Brazil-style fantasy only adds to its strangely melancholy air as it insists on sympathy for the devil even whilst showing each of his sadistic crimes for the ugly, bloody messes they really are. Maybe the reason everybody feels they’re to blame is that in some way they are yet everyone has done things they regret or aren’t proud of, wishing they’d done things differently or managed to find the courage to do what they thought was right rather than choosing to protect themselves or keep their head down when they could have saved someone else pain. Betrayals can be small things, but they fester – like those unspoken emotions which were making our guys so unhappy in the first place. There are no innocents in Hime-anole save perhaps for the ones pushed further than they could endure, but there are those finally facing up to their own flaws and attempting to do things differently now they know better. If that’s not progress, what is?

Original trailer (no subtitles)

Enemies In-Law (위험한 상견례 2, Kim Jin-young, 2015)

June 10, 2017by Hayley Scanlon4 Comments

enemies in-law poster It’s tough when parents don’t approve of their children’s romantic partners, but fortunately most realise there’s nothing they can do about it so the best thing is to feign civility (and avoid saying I told you so when it all goes wrong). Unfortunately the older generation of Kim Jin-young’s Enemies In-Law (위험한 상견례 2, Wiheomhan Sanggyeonrye 2), a kind of follow up to his 2011 effort Meet the In-Laws, are of a very much more hands on mindset. One side is a police family in which literally everyone for generations has worked in law enforcement, and the other is headed by a pair of international artefacts thieves determined to live life on their own terms. You might think this is a situation ripe for comedy, and it is. Only, in a very strange and not altogether successful way.

Park Young-hee (Jin Se-yeon) and her fellow Olympian sister Young-sook (Kim Do-yeon) are on the way back from a fencing competition when their policeman father, Man-choon (Kim Eung-soo), gets into a car chase with the son of the two criminals he’s been trying to catch for years. Chul-soo (Hong Jong-hyun), a high school student with an expensive sports car, comes out on top but displays unexpected heroism when he notices the Park family car is on fire and someone is still trapped inside. Dousing himself with water he valiantly rescues Young-hee just before the car explodes and the pair fall in love at first sight.

Man-choon most definitely does not approve of this union, but Chul-soo vows to leave the criminal world behind and join the police like the rest of the Park family. Seven years later he’s still trying to pass the police exam and in a committed relationship with the now successful policewoman (and former Olympic gold medallist) Young-hee. As it looks like Chul-soo is about to achieve his goal, both the Parks and his parents Dal-sik (Shin Jung-geun) and Gang-ja (Jeon Soo-kyung), become increasingly worried about the marriage of crime and justice. Accordingly they form an unlikely alliance to break the pair up at all costs.

Enemies In-Law has its share of oddness, but remains disappointingly conventional in its comedic approach. The most objectionable aspect manifests itself in a persistent layer of fat jokes, mostly at the expense of Olympian judoist Young-sook whose weight is the constant butt of every joke in which she is derided as unattractive, greedy, lazy, and mannish. Despite the fact that the sisters seemingly each hold high offices in the police force, the overriding tone is a socially conservative one, even shoehorning in a bathing beauty sequence in which policewoman Young-hee is forced to dance lasciviously in a red bikini followed by her sister in a much frumpier one in another predictable and unfunny joke, as part of an odd sequence investigating a “secret” hostess bar. The jokes are at least mitigated by the fact Yuong-sook could not care any less what anyone thinks about her and is fine with both her appearance and anything anyone might have to say about it.

The major crisis point in the relationship comes when Chul-soo becomes fed up with the situation and captures his parents, presenting them to Man-choon tied up like two prize turkeys. This, he hopes, will be enough to get them to give in and accept him as a son-in-law, but he makes a rookie mistake. Young-hee, disappointed in him and getting the impression she’s become the subject of a “trade”, resolutely rejects Chul-soo’s attempt to buy her hand in marriage from her father with a slap to the face and a swift exit. The women have been bypassed as Chul-soo attempts to deal directly with Man-choon and the decision of the two men to view their relations as objects to be exchanged is rightly criticised in its effect of almost ending the entire endeavour and causing a possibly permanent rift with Young-hee.

Things also take a darker turn with the ongoing investigation the sisters are working on which involves a number of rapes and murders of well to do single women. In contrast with Chul-soo’s parents whose criminal enterprise is apparently successful, the police are depicted as blithering idiots who couldn’t catch a chicken in a supermarket. Using such a serious and unpleasant crime spree for comic value seems in poor taste even given the obvious throw away quality of the film, though it does provide the final plot motivation to bring everyone together as the master criminals have to step in to point the police in the right direction, even if Chul-soon’s mother has to pretend to be President Park Geun-hye to do it.

For a film which involves the ability to talk to dogs as a major device, Enemies In-Law never fully embraces its absurdism, leaving it with a curiously uneven tone which might have benefitted from even more silliness. Shifting from romantic comedy to police procedural in an interesting series of straight to camera monologues with re-enactments, Enemies In-Law takes its cues from popular TV dramas and pushes them in a more interesting direction but the jokes are never really big enough to pay off. Amusing enough, at times, but poorly pitched and uneven, Enemies In-Law is not the film it claims to be, but fails to be much of anything else either.

Original trailer (English subtitles)

Cops vs. Thugs (県警対組織暴力, Kinji Fukasaku, 1975)

June 9, 2017by Hayley ScanlonLeave a comment

Cops vs Thugs – a battle fraught with friendly fire. Arising from additional research conducted for the first Battles Without Honour and Humanity series and scripted by the author of the first four films, Kazuo Kasahara, Cops vs Thugs (県警対組織暴力, Kenkei tai Soshiki Boryoku) shifts the action west but otherwise remains firmly within the same universe. This is a world of cops and robbers, but like bored little boys everyone seems to forget which side it was they were on – if they truly were on any other side than their own. There are few winners, and losers hit the ground before feeling the humiliation, but the one thing which is clear is that the thin blue line is so thin as to almost be transparent and if you have to choose your defenders, a thug may do as well as a cop.

A dodgy looking guy in a dirty mac roughs up some equally dodgy looking kids. Given that the shady looking fella is played by Bunta Sugawara you’d peg him for a petty thug, but against the odds Kuno is a cop – just one with a taste for crumpled raincoats. The town he’s policing is one in the midst of ongoing gang strife following a series of breakaways and civil wars throughout the ‘50s. Things are coming to a head as rival bosses of the two breakaway factions, Hirotani (Hiroki Matsukata) and Kawade (Mikio Narita), vie for power while a former yakuza politician, Tomoyasu (Nobuo Kaneko), does his best to stir up trouble between them that Kuno is trying to keep from exploding into all out war.

Cops vs Thugs is as cynical as they come but slightly more sympathetic to its desperate, now middle aged men whose youth was wasted in the post-war wasteland. The central tenet of the film is neatly exposed by a drunken gangster who points out that at heart there’s little difference between a cop and a yakuza aside from their choice of uniform. Policemen, like gangsters, follow a code – the law, carry a gun, are fiercely loyal to their brotherhood, and at the mercy of their superiors. Good jobs were hard to come by in the devastation following the surrender, in fact one of the reasons company uniforms became so popular was that no one had decent clothes to wear and a providing a uniform was a small thing that a company could to do increase someone’s sense of wellbeing, community, and engender the feeling of family within a corporate context. The police uniform, even if it’s reduced to a badge and a gun, does something similar, as do a yakuza’s tattoos. They literally say someone has your back and will come running when you’re in trouble.

These drop outs with nowhere left to turn eventually found themselves one side of a line or on the other – the choice may have been arbitrary. Kuno says he became a cop because he wanted to carry a gun, something he could have done either way but for one reason or another he chose authority over misrule. Cops being friends with yakuza sounds counter intuitive, but many of these men grew up alongside each other, attended the same schools, perhaps even have relatives in common.

Both the police and the yakuza claim to be the defenders of honest, working people but neither of them quite means what they say. Police brutality is rife while yakuza battles reach new levels of violent chaos including, at one point, a beheading in the middle of a sunlit street. Yet the greatest threats to the population at large aren’t coming from such obvious sources, they’re hardwired into the system. Sleazy politico Tomoyasu spends his time in hostess bars and schmoozes with gangsters he uses to do his dirty work while the press look on gleefully at having something to report. Kuno may not be a candidate for police officer of the year, but he tells himself that his policy is one of appeasement, and that working with organised crime is the best way to protect the ordinary citizen. When you’re forced to work within a corrupt system, perhaps there is something to be said for flexibility.

For all of the nihilistic cynicism Fukasaku retains his ironic sense of humour, staging a violent, inefficient, and bloody murder in a tiny room where a sweet song about maternal love in which a woman sings of her hopes for the bright future of her son is playing a healthy volume. Corruption defines this world but more than that it’s the legacy of post-war desperation that says on the one hand that it’s every man for himself, but that it’s also necessary to pick a side. Cops, thugs – the distinction is often unimportant. There is sympathy for these men, and sadness for the world that built them, but there’s anger here too for those who play the system for their own ends and are content to see others pay the price for it.

Available now from Arrow Video!

Original trailer (English subtitles)

Originally published by UK Anime Network.

29+1 (Kearen Pang, 2016)

June 8, 2017by Hayley ScanlonLeave a comment

29+1 poster You know what they call women over 25 in China? “Christmas cake” – no one wants you after the 25th, so you’re condemned to sit on the shelf for all eternity like a piece of overproduced seasonal confectionary (a silly analogy because Christmas cakes, at least English ones, may outlive us all). Christy Lam lives in Hong Kong, not mainland China, and so her worries are a little less intense but still the dreaded 30 is causing its own share of panic and confusion in her otherwise orderly, tightly controlled life. In 29+1 Kearen Pang adapts her own enormously successful 2005 stage play about the intertwined lives of two very different women who happen to share a birthday and are each approaching the end of their 20s in very different ways. By turns melancholy and hopeful, 29+1 finds both women at a natural crossroads but rather than casting them into a bottomless pit of despair, allows each of them to rediscover themselves through a kind of second adolescence in which they finally figure out what it is they want out of life.

Christy Lam’s (Chrissie Chau) morning routine is fairly well entrenched. The alarm clock ticks over from 6.29 to 6.30 and she rises, goes through her beauty regime, decides on an appropriate outfit for work, eats a low cal breakfast and then heads out. A month before her 30th birthday, Christy begins to feel restless but her life is good – she has a long-term boyfriend and she’s just received a promotion at work where she is both liked and respected for her talents. So why does she feel so…unsatisfied?

Like the grim harbinger of encroaching doom, the rot has already set in as symbolised by a leak in her apartment which has created a nasty stain on her pristine white walls and even spread to some of her precious handbags. Her landlord pledges to look at it, but unbeknownst to Christy his wife has sold the apartment she’s been renting and she’s being kicked out with no notice. The landlord suggests moving in with her boyfriend but this proves unattractive for several reasons and so Christy ends up house sitting for a friend of the landlord’s nephew who is spending a month in Paris giving Christy some breathing space to figure things out.

Offering frequent asides to the audience, Christy’s acerbic observations of modern life and the expectations placed on women are both familiar and extremely funny. Running through her daily routine with wry irony, it’s clear Christy resents having to jump through all these hoops but also accepts them as just a part of being 29 in 2005. Catching a bus the morning after finding the leak in her apartment, she finds a former professor, now an insurance salesman, sitting across the aisle. After somewhat tactlessly remarking that she looks “completely different” from her college self, the professor then goes on to ask all the impolite questions people ask 29-year-old women as regards her job and marital status before getting into pension plans and mortgages. His insurance pitch proves a hit, and every other youngish woman (and one man acting on behalf of a little sister) picks up one of his information packs too.

At work at least, Christy is faring a little better. Unexpectedly receiving a promotion from her infinitely likeable if hardline boss, Elaine (Elaine Jin), Christy feels conflicted. The job is everything she thought she wanted, but suddenly she feels out-of-place – disconnected from her former colleagues and only now picking up on the immense gulf between herself, preparing to enter middle age with strict diets and bundling up to fight the aggressive air conditioning, and the new recruits – cheerfully wolfing down cakes and sugary drinks, dressed only in their light summer dresses and gossiping or boasting about slacking off even to the boss’ face. Despite her success Elaine is an approachable and friendly woman, prepared to give some real advice to her young protégé to the end that there are choices involved in everything and sometimes it comes to the point you need to make them rather than let things drag on.

Choices are things Christy’s avoided making, despite approaching life with an intense need for control. Facing several crises at once from her father’s Alzheimer’s to a strained relationship with her boyfriend of ten years, Christy is forced into a position she might not have welcomed but grudgingly admits may actually have been for the best. The apartment she ends up living in temporarily belongs to a young woman named Wong Ting-lok (Joyce Cheng) and, in contrast to Christy’s former home, is filled with a quirky sense of personality from the large Eiffel Tower of Polaroids pinned to the wall to the Leslie Cheung VHS collection and large number of vinyl records all of which Christy is welcome to enjoy. It is, however, Tin-lok’s “autobiography” that comes to capture her attention.

Tin-lok is a woman defined by her love of life and innate talent for cheerfulness even in adversity. Unlike Christy, her life has been less marked by the conventionally “successful” as she’s held down the same casual job in a record store run by a former celebrity for the past ten years and has never had a proper boyfriend despite her close friendship with Hon-ming (Babyjohn Choi) – the nephew of Christy’s landlord. Sometimes her lack of progress gets her down which explains the diary and the Polaroids – she likes to record her “achievements” in a more concrete way, but Tin-lok is, broadly, at home with herself. A recent crisis striking just as Christy’s had, prompts her into action – doing the things she’d always wanted to do in the knowledge that every moment is precious and there is no time to waste.

Pang gradually shifts into a kind of magical realism as the lives of Christy and Tin-lok begin to merge with Christy experiencing the life of Tin-lok from a first person perspective. Both women re-live old memories, inserting their current selves into a long passed era and looking back at it both with wistful nostalgia and the immediacy of unforgotten feeling. Christy’s trusted taxi driver laments that young people don’t know how to fix things anymore, every time something breaks they throw it out and buy a new one. Christy is learning how to make repairs to fractured dreams but thanks to some help from the resilient warmth of Tin-lok, finally figures out that things fall into place when you let them and you don’t have to make all your decisions based on what others have already decided for you.

Original trailer (English subtitles)

Dearest Sister (ນ້ອງຮັກ, Mattie Do, 2016)

June 7, 2017June 7, 2017by Hayley ScanlonLeave a comment

dearest sister poster Marxist countries and horror movies often do not mix. Laos has only a fledgling cinema industry and Mattie Do, returning with her second film Dearest Sister (ນ້ອງຮັກ, Nong hak), is its only female filmmaker even if she finds herself a member of an extremely small group. Set in Laos it may be, but Dearest Sister also has something of the European gothic in its instantly recognisable tale of a good country girl fetching up in the city only to be treated like a poor relation and eventually corrupted by its dubious charms. Dearest Sister is a horror movie but one which places very real fears, albeit ones imbued with superstition, at the forefront of its tragedy.

Nok (Amphaiphun Phommapunya) is a poor girl from the country. She’s been given a good opportunity though one she perhaps would not have sought. She’ll be leaving her village and going to the big city to look after a distant relative whom she has never met. Stopping off at a temple to pray before she leaves, Nok’s boyfriend angrily skulks off, lamenting that she’ll be gone at least a year and will probably have found herself a European husband before the time is up.

When she arrives in the city Nok is met by an impatient European who turns out to be Jakob (Tambet Tuisk), the husband of her mysterious relative, Ana. Nok is to be a kind of paid companion, looking after Ana (Vilouna Phetmany) who is in poor health. Slowly losing her sight, Ana has strange episodes and frightening visions, sometimes injuring herself in a trance state that she will remember nothing of after she wakes up.

This is a land of ghosts but they’re less of the literal than the spiritual kind as Nok and Ana chase spectres of the same dream which continues to elude them both. Ana, it seems, is from a middle class background but her parents are quick enough to touch her husband for money they can use for material pleasures, barely acknowledging Ana’s ongoing health issues. Marrying Jakob perhaps means marrying out as well as up, but it hasn’t brought her the life of freedom she dreamed of even if it has made her more comfortable. Jakob’s behaviour flits between loving husband, impatient spouse, and controlling master as he, at one minute, appears to genuinely worry about his wife’s need for treatment and the next argues with a doctor about medicating her with the kind of drugs you only really hear about on TV.

When Nok arrives in the house she alters the dynamic. If Jakob wanted her to be a kind of human pet, keeping Ana company and perhaps keeping her sane in the process, his plan backfires. The two women are in someway related, though neither of them is aware precisely how (apparently they are distant cousins), but Nok has come there as an employee, not a guest. Caught between two worlds, Nok is not “family” enough to enjoy a free and friendly relationship with Jakob and Ana, but she’s not a servant either as Ana’s constant reminders that they have a maid to take care of the housework bare out. Playing the mistress, Ana is not a cruel harridan but is determined to exert her authority and so servants live outside the main house, while Nok lives “inside” – a key distinction but one which leaves her in a halfway home.

When she first arrives at Ana’s, Nok is an innocent country girl, fully intending to send the money she makes back to her family and rejects another maid’s suggestion of a night on the town because she has a boyfriend waiting for her back in the village. Skimming a small amount of money to pay for credit to use on her broken phone starts Nok off on a journey to the dark side as she gets distracted, misses the bank and buys lottery tickets with the money instead. A simple country girl, Nok does not quite know how to live the high class life (as the titters in a restaurant make her realise when she orders wine but doesn’t know why the waiter doesn’t pour a whole glass) but she wants it anyway.

Nok and Ana were not so different. Nok’s family only seem to ring her to ask where the money is and eventually the village life she’d begun to become nostalgic for seems to have forgotten her already. Tragically both women want the same thing which is to live comfortably, but also with love. Nok’s isolation drives her deeper into a cycle of avarice and resentment, whereas the imposed isolation of Ana’s illness deepens her sense of neurosis and mistrust of her new environment. Eventually greed mingles with dread as both women long to escape their fates but are resigned to the inevitability of their eventual downfall not just heralded by spirits but haunted by a culture.

Streaming in the UK exclusively on Shudder.

Original trailer (English subtitles)

The Villainess to Close New York Asian Film Festival 2017

June 6, 2017by Hayley ScanlonLeave a comment

the villainess poster Fresh from its Cannes premiere, Jung Byoung-gil’s The Villainess will close the 16th edition of the New York Asian Film Festival which returns to the city from 30th June to 16th July 2017. Thailand’s Bad Genius will open the festival while the Centrepiece Gala will showcase one of the best recent films from the Philippines, Mikhail Red’s Birdshot. Altogether there are 57 films included in this year’s lineup hailing from China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, The Philippines, Vietnam, and Malaysia. The full lineup is as follows:

China

Battle of Memories poster Thrillers dominate the Chinese slate beginning with:

Battle of Memories – a sci-fi thriller in which a man erases memories of his failed marriage only for his soon to be ex-wife to order him to retrieve them, only he accidentally ends up with the memories of a serial killer instead.
Blood of Youth – a youthful cyber thriller.
Duckweed – Han Han’s time travel drama sees a son finally getting to know his petty gangster father.
Extraordinary Mission – Alan Mak teams up with Anthony Pun for another undercover cop action fest.
Someone to Talk to – Yulin Liu’s adaptation of her father’s novel examines the essential loneliness of Chinese society as reflected in the modern marriage. Review.
Soul on a String – Zhang Yang returns with an existential epic taking place in the Tibetan deserts. Review.

Hong Kong Panorama

coldwar 2 2017 marks 20 years since the Hong Kong handover and the New York Asian Film Festival not only showcases some of the best HK films from the past two decades but also includes a look forward with work from the most promising voices of tomorrow.

Cold War 2 – Sequel to the original Cold War, Cold War 2 sees Aaron Kwok return as Hong Kong’s incorruptible police chief still dealing with the aftermath of uncovering mass corruption and with a team of missing policemen still held captive. Review.
Dealer/Healer – Sean Lau and Gordon Lam co-star in a ’70s crime drama.
Election – Jonnie To’s 2005 classic needs no introduction but stars Simon Yam in a tale of raw gangster ambition.
Mad World – Shawn Yue and Eric Tsang star in a moving tale of a father trying to understand his son’s bipolar depression.
Our Time Will Come – Ann Hui tells the story of legendary World War II resistance operative “Fang Gu”.
Soul Mate – Derek Tsang’s moving melodrama is an ode to the power of female friendship. Review.
The Taking of Tiger Mountain – Tsui Hark’s tale of civil war banditry.
This is not what I Expected – Romantic comedy starring Takeshi Kaneshiro and Zhou Dongyu
Vampire Cleanup Department – A young man discovers his vampire hunter heritage at the same time as falling for a vampire in this retro horror comedy.
With Prisoners – A young man gets into a fight and is sent to a notorious juvenile detention centre practicing extreme, hard-line “rehabilitative” techniques in Andrew Wong’s drama. Official competition.
Zombiology: Enjoy Yourself Tonight – Two slackers decide to do their civic duty when the zombie apocalypse strikes.

Japan

double-life A varied lineup from Japan features everything from the Roman Porno reboot to LGBT comedy, quirky sc-fi, and moving family drama.

Aroused by Gymnopedies – Isao Yukisada’s entry into the Roman Porno reboot series stars Itsuji Itao as a penniless filmmaker who makes use of the various women in his life to try and improve his dismal circumstances.
Close-Knit – less quirky than Ogigami’s other work, Close-Knit is a beautiful family drama in which a neglected little girl finds a family she can feel a part of with her uncle and his transgender girlfriend. Review.
Dawn of the Felines – Directed by Koji Shiraishi, this Roman Porno reboot takes inspiration from Night of the Felines but casts its three heroines into a much darker world. Review.
Destruction Babies – Tetsuya Mariko paints a grim picture of his nation’s youth in this hard-hitting, nihilistic drama. Review.
A Double Life – This impressive debut feature from Yoshiyuki Kishi takes a long look at voyeurism and the damaging effects of obsession. Official Competition. Review.
Happiness – Sabu’s indie leaning sci-fi drama is a meditation on guilt, memory, vengeance and the true nature of happiness. Review.
Japanese Girls Never Die – Daigo Matsui adapts Mariko Yamauchi’s novel in which a young woman goes missing and prompts a citywide movement.
The Long Excuse – Miwa Nishikawa adapts her own novel in which a self-centred former novelist turned B-list celebrity is forced to re-examine himself following his wife’s death. Review.
Love and Other Cults – Eiji Uchida’s latest tells a depressing story of misused and misdirected love. Review.
Mole Song: Hong Kong Capriccio – Takashi Miike and undercover cop Reiji are back with more improbably zany action.
Rage – Lee Sang-il adapts another Shuichi Yoshida novel examining three interconnected stories of suspicion following a brutal Tokyo murder.
Suffering of Ninko – A buddhist monk tries his best to remain celibate, but he’s just too pretty. Review.
Survival Family – When the power suddenly goes off one ordinary family takes to the road but finds it much harder than they expected in Shinobu Yaguchi’s absurd comedy. Review.
Traces of Sin – Kei Ishikawa’s dark crime drama stars Satoshi Tsumabuki as a depressed reporter tying to avoid his sister’s incarceration for child neglect by investigating the brutal murder of the ideal family. Review.
Wet Woman in the Wind – a writer retreats to the country only to run into a nymphomaniac waitress in Akihiro Shiota’s Roman Porno reboot.

Korea

vanishing-time Cyber crime, fantasy, and gentle whimsy mingle in an eclectic selection from Korea.

Fabricated City – A young man is framed for a brutal murder in this impressively designed cyber thriller. Review.
Fantasy of the Girls – Romantic confusion plagues a production of Romeo and Juliet in this high school drama.
Jane – A hit in Busan, Jane follows a transgender woman who takes in homeless kids. Official Competition.
Ordinary Person – Kim Bong-han’s drama stars Son Hyun-joo as a hardworking policeman who gets caught up in a conspiracy.
A Quiet Dream – Zhang Lu’s gently ephemeral meditation on dislocation. Review.
A Single Rider – Lee Byung-hun stars as a bankrupt fund manager discovering some uncomfortable secrets when making an impromptu visit to his wife and son in Australia.
Split – Drama in which an autistic boy’s talent for bowling is exploited by an unscrupulous couple who later come to care for him.
The Tooth and the Nail – A man is accused of murdering his chauffeur in this post-war mystery.
The Truth Beneath – a politician’s daughter goes missing during a campaign and her mother will stop at nothing to find out what happened. Review.
Vanishing Time: A Boy Who Returned – Uhm Tae-hwa’s time slip drama is a beautifully designed tribute to childhood friendship. Review.
The Villainess – Fresh from its Cannes premiere, Jung Byung-gil’s The Villainess will close the festival and follows an undercover assassin torn between two men from her past.

Southeast Asia

Bad Geniuses Casting the net wider the festival will also showcase some of the best recent hits from underrepresented areas of Asia:

Bad Genius – The opening night gala, Bad Genius sees a group of super smart students earning extra money by cheating on tests set off on a mission to Australia to get the answers to the big exam and send them back to Thailand before their friends sit it. Official Competition.
Birdshot – A series of horrifying crimes are revealed when a Philippine Eagle is shot by mistake in Mikhail Red’s mystery drama. Official Competition.
Kfc – Vietnamese body horror from Le Binh Giang. Official Competition.
Mrs. K – A former assassin attempts to save her husband and daughter from the legacy of her own past in this Malaysian action drama starring Kara Hui.
Saving Sally – Unusual romantic comedy from the Philippines mixing live action and animation.
Town in a Lake – The secrets of a small town are exposed when a young girl is murdered in Jet Leyco’s Philippine drama.

Taiwan

The Gangster_s Daughter poster Pick your poison – monsters, gangsters and love dominate the entries from Taiwan.

Eternal Summer – LGBT drama in which the intense friendship between two boys is thrown into confusion when a girl arrives from the city.
The Gangster’s Daughter – Unusual family drama in which a gangster resumes custody of his estranged daughter and brings her to the city from her rural home. Official Competition.
Godspeed – Black comedy in which a drug dealer gets derailed by a well-meaning taxi driver.
Mon Mon Mon Monsters – Horrible kids catch a strange creature and then torture it before hastening the apocalypse in Ko Gidden’s provocative teen horror/comedy.
Road to Mandalay – Two migrants fall in love on the way to Bangkok but find their romance frustrated by the difficulties of city life in Midi Z’s indie drama.
The Village of No Return – New Year action comedy which takes place in an isolated village where the population has had its memory wiped so the people can live “happily”.

Documentaries

Banseom Pirates poster Only two documentaries on offer this year, both from Korea:

Bamseom Pirates Seoul Inferno – Jung Yoon-suk’s second documentary centres on the titular Korean punk bank but uses them as a springboard to explore youthful resistance in modern Korean society.
Mrs. B., A North Korean Woman – Jero Yun’s documentary follows its protagonist over three years as she tries to build a life for herself after being (unintentionally) trafficked out of North Korea.

The 16th New York Asian Film Festival runs from 30th June to 16th July 2017 at Film Society’s Walter Reade Theater and SVA Theatre, and will also welcome a number of high-profile guests including veteran HK actor Tony Leung Ka-fai who will receive the 2017 Star Asia NYAFF Lifetime Achievement Award, Korean actor Gang Dong-won who will receive the Star Asia Award, and Thai actress Chutimon “Aokbab” Chuengcharoensukying who will receive the Screen International Rising Star Asia Award. Tickets for the festival will be available to the public from 15th June but members of Film Society or Subway Cinema are entitled to priority booking from June 13.

You can find all the latest information on the official website, Facebook page, and Twitter feed.

Dynamite Wolf (おっさんのケーフェイ, Kohei Taniguchi, 2017)

June 6, 2017by Hayley Scanlon3 Comments

dynamite wolf poster Back in the day, lucha libre-style wrestling was hugely popular in Japan. Tiger Mask, a manga set in the world of Japanese pro-wrestling remains a firm favourite and its eponymous hero has also become a byword for altruistic philanthropy as well-meaning anonymous donors donate expensive gifts such as Japanese school backpacks to orphanages in Tiger Mask’s name. Sadly, pro-wrestling is no longer as high-profile as it once was and has left mainstream television screens far behind even if it still maintains a small but dedicated fanbase. Kohei Taniguchi’s Dynamite Wolf (おっさんのケーフェイ, Ossan no Kefei) is out to change all that by shining a spotlight on this almost forgotten phenomenon of crazy outfits, killer moves, and camp showmanship.

Middle schooler Hiroto is the most ordinary of little boys. He has two good friends, but no particular, hopes, dreams, talents, or aspirations. When his teacher assigns the class a special project in which they are supposed to come up with some kind of act they can do before the class to showcase a special skill, Hiroto is at a loss. His friend Takuto is going to whilstle whilst recent transfer student from Tokyo, Naoya, is going to show off his English but neither of them have any suggestions to help Hiroto figure out what his special talent is. Things only get worse when his mother catches sight of another boy, Teruo, on television being showcased on the news because of his dedication to dance, and insists Hiroto go to dance classes too which he is not really interested in. On the way back however his life changes when he spots a man in a strange shiny suit standing outside smoking. Invited inside, Hiroto witnesses the last ever fight of the legendary wrestler Dynamite Wolf and becomes instantly hooked on Japanese pro-wrestling.

Times being what they are, pro-wrestling is not the coolest of hobbies but Hiroto is undeterred. Running into an old man he thinks might by the real Dynamite Wolf, Hiroto starts training to become a wrestler and roping Takuto and Naoya in to practice too. As Naoya points out, anyone seeing three young kids wrestling around with a 50-year-old man would probably call the police but Mr. Sakata really is just interested in spreading the love of wrestling to the younger generation.

Despite the anti-wrestling sentiment, there’s something quite refreshing about the boys who like boyband-style dancing being the bullies and not the bullied. Teruo is a nasty piece of work and a spoilt brat thanks to the fact his dad is the head of the PTA but his love of dance is never questioned or mocked and is even favoured over the comparatively more “manly” hobby of wrestling.

Like any good kids movie, Dynamite Wolf is equally about the power of friendship as it is about reviving pro-wrestling. Teruo starts out as a little thug, behaving with impunity and making Hiroto’s life a nightmare simply because he’s not quite like them. However, once he learns some unpleasant stuff about his dad his world crumbles and he reforms to become a wrestling ally and all round better person.

Hiroto proves far more mature than his mentor who has repeatedly failed to achieve his dreams and now exists in a strange kind of perpetual childhood, trapped inside his own delusions. Unfairly branded a liar, Sakata does like a few tall tales and remains embittered about his lack of his success. His life has been about wrestling, but the ring has never accepted him and now he spends all his time beating up a blow-up doll on the beach and visiting sex workers for lucha libre workouts. His desire to mentor the boys is a noble one in the service of wrestling, but then again are wrestling skills really worth anything when outsiders simply ignore the rules and go for a one punch knock out?

Taking on a Rocky vibe, the question stops being about winning or losing but about finding your passion and then giving it your all even if it doesn’t end in the predictable fashion. Pro-wrestling might be over the top and campy, more about showmanship and ritual than signature moves technical skill but the friendships, loyalties, and sense of fair play are values which deserve to be fought for – mask on or off.

Dynamite Wolf was screened at the 17th Nippon Connection Japanese Film Festival.

Original trailer (no subtitles)

Poolsideman (プールサイドマン, Hirobumi Watanabe, 2016)

June 5, 2017September 23, 2017by Hayley Scanlon3 Comments

Around halfway through Poolsideman (プールサイドマン), the director himself playing an overly chatty colleague of the film’s protagonist, embarks on a lengthy rant about encroaching middle-age which is instantly relatable to those who find themselves at a similar juncture. He’s sure the world seemed better when he was a child, there wasn’t all of this distress and anxiety – everything just seemed like it would go on forever but time has inexplicably sped up with a series of rapid changes packed into recent years. The life of a poolsideman is improbably intense, or at least it is for Mizuhara (Gaku Imamura) whose days are all the same but filled with tension and the low simmer of something waiting to explode. Loosely inspired by the real life case of a man who left Japan for the Middle East with the idea of joining Isis, Poolsideman wants to explore why such a surreal thing might happen but finds it all too plausible.

Mizuhara lives his life to strict routine. He gets up, turns on his radio to listen to the latest current events which mostly have to do with atrocities in the Middle East, eats breakfast and goes to work where he checks the lockers, patrols the pool, writes down various readings from the boiler system, and avoids his colleagues at break times by sitting outside or eating shortbread in his car before leaving for the day. He then goes to a local cinema where he is generally the only audience member and watches a violent film full of shooting, explosions and screaming, before grabbing a McDonald’s dinner and going home to bed.

His precious routine is broken when one of his colleagues informs him that they’re both being sent to a different pool to help out with staff shortages and asks if it would be possible to give him a lift because the pool is kind of far and he is only a “paper driver” – he has a license, but in reality doesn’t drive. It’s not as if Mizuhara can refuse, and so the pair drive together to another pool where they do the same job only in different surroundings.

The first hour or so of this two hour film is entirely taken up with Mizuhara repeating his near identical days while different news reports play recounting various international atrocities. Mizuhara never says anything and runs through each of his tasks with robotic precision but there’s something burning somewhere just behind his eyes. He looks at his colleagues with disdain as they gossip raucously in the rec room before taking himself outside to smoke or enjoy his daily shortbread alone in his car listening to more reports of terrible things happening abroad. Despite his apparent calmness, Mizuhara does indeed seem like the type who may just snap but deciding to join Isis is not necessarily the result most would have predicted.

Poolsideman’s main position is that blanket news coverage of horrific events may have strained Mizuhara’s already tense mind, leading him to believe the world is a worse place than it really is. Later, he switches his radio preferences but sticks with international politics as the world swings right – Trump, at that point still a candidate, suggests using nuclear weapons against “enemy” forces in the Middle East (something particularly worrying to the only nation so far with direct experience of nuclear attack) while Obama and Clinton attempt to talk sense. Britain votes for Brexit, against expectation and its own interest which, the commentator explains, is expected to lead to the destabilisation of Cameron’s government, extreme economic chaos, and political turmoil (on point, as it seems). Mizuhara carries on as before, cereal, toothbrushing, the pool, the cinema, and McDonald’s but there’s always the feeling that he’s standing on the edge about to jump and there’s no way to know how he might do it.

Less ostensibly humorous than And The Mudship Sails Away, Poolsideman still finds room for comedy though mostly through the amusing monologues delivered by Watanabe to the ever silent Mizuhara. Ranting about modern life from an inability to connect with the young to the noise pollution of hipster karaoke bars and ramen restaurants that make you book a ticket in advance, Watanabe’s observations are all too true but at least he works out his frustration with friendliness and good humour rather than internalising some kind of barely suppressed rage which threatens to boil over at any second. A kind of state of the nation address, Poolsideman gestures at the enemy within – the ignored, frustrated, and angry young man whose mind is ripe for hijacking when assaulted by a constant barrage of violence and political disturbance. Ending on a note of ambiguous tension Poolsideman wonders where all of this leads, or if it leads anywhere at all, but offers no easy answers for the problem of Japan’s disillusioned youth.

Poolsideman was screened at the 17th Nippon Connection Japanese Film Festival.

Original trailer (no subtitles)

Toronto Japanese Film Festival 2017 opens with Fueled: The Man They Called Pirate

June 4, 2017June 4, 2017by Hayley Scanlon3 Comments

over the fence still 1 Now in its fifth year, Toronto’s Japanese Film Festival is back with another excellent selection of recent and classic cinema hits. Expanded to include a few extra guests and even more movies, the festival runs from 8th – 28th June and will also boast an appearance by one of Japan’s best loved actors, Joe Odagiri, who will introduce both Her Love Boils Bathwater and Over the Fence.

The festival kicks off with a screening of Fueled: A Man they Called Pirate, an adaptation of the novel by Naoki Hyakuta. Inspired by real events and directed by Eternal Zero‘s Takashi Yamazaki, A Man they Called Pirate is the story of one very determined Japanese oil man who is convinced his country’s future lies in oil rather than coal and commandeers an oil tanker to sail to Iran to prove his point.

scoop! Masaharu Fukuyama stars as a jaded paparazzo rediscovering his photojournalist mojo in Hitoshi One’s oddly moving satire of the gutter press, Scoop!. Review.

himeanole still Romantic dreams so often turn to nightmares, but rarely with the blood soaked fury of Keisuke Yoshida’s Himeanole.

Ai Hashimoto and Aoi Miyazaki star as a mother and daughter cruelly separated by fate in Yasuhiro Yoshida’s family melodrama, Birthday Wishes.

Chihafuru Part one of Norihiro Koizumi’s Karuta themed drama Chihayafuru stars three of the best up and coming Japanese actors in Suzu Hirose, Mone Kamishiraishi, and Shuhei Nomura.

Part II will also screen at the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre in July.

A sequel to Samurai Hustle, Samurai Hustle Returns continues in the same vein as the hapless Edo era heroes finally get home only to see it under threat from unscrupulous lords.

rudolf the black cat still Rudolf the Black Cat follows its titular kitty as he finds himself lost and homeless in Tokyo after venturing outside of his native Gifu.

midnight diner still Inspired by the hit TV show, Master is headed to the big screen in the Midnight Diner movie which sees him take in a mysterious young girl. Review.

The second Midnight Diner movie will also be screening at the Japanese Cultural Centre Toronto during July.

satoshi still Satoshi: A Move for Tomorrow stars Kenichi Matsuyama in a biopic of tragic shogi player Satoshi who gave everything in the name of the game. Review.

A highlight of this year’s programme, Tai Kato’s little seen and recently restored documentary The Ondekoza was filmed over a period of two years and follows the small group of musicians who went on to create the taiko drumming style which has become so popular overseas.

her love boils bathwater still A big winner at this year’s Japan Academy Prize, Her Love Boils Bathwater is another heartwarming/rending family drama from Capturing Dad director Ryota Nakano and stars Rie Miyazawa as goodhearted woman suddenly struck by tragedy. Joe Odagiri will also be attending to present the film. Review.

over the fence still One of two films recently released by Nobuhiro Yamashita, Over the Fence is the third in a series of film adaptations inspired by the beautifully bleak works of Hakodate native Yasushi Sato. Joe Odagiri will also be in attendance to present the film in which he plays a recently divorced man returning to his home town but failing to start over until he meets eccentric bar girl/zoo keeper Satoshi. Review.

Haruka Ayase stars in Honnouji Hotel – a classic example of the time slip movie in which she steps into a hotel elevator only to emerge at the 16th century court of Oda Nobunaga (Shinichi Tsutsumi)!

I am a hero still Comedian Yo Oizumi plays an aspiring mangaka with big dreams and possibly deluded hopes who finally discovers the power of his ordinariness during the zombie apocalypse in Shinsuke Sato’s blockbuster action/comedy I am a Hero. Review.

what a wonderful family still Yoji Yamada reunites with the cast of Tokyo Family and a few more old friends for another tale of humorous family drama, What a Wonderful Family. Review.

projects still Japan’s housing estates were once symbols of post-war aspiration but now they’re largely deserted and home only to elderly residents prepared to put up with cramped conditions, no lifts, and basic amenities. Junji Sakamoto returns with a surreal comedy satirising everything from gossipy village mentality to alien invasion in the warmhearted if wistful Danchi (AKA The Projects). Review.

What's for dinner mom still Two sisters return to their family home which is about to be torn down only to find a collection of recipes left behind by their late Taiwanese mother who died twenty years before in Mitsuhito Shiraha’s food/family drama, What’s for Dinner, Mom?

shin godzilla still Godzilla is back and bigger than ever in Hideaki Anno & Shinji Higuchi’s Shin Godzilla.

gukouroku still Gukoroku: Traces of Sin begins in classic thriller territory as depressed reporter Tanaka immerses himself in the still unsolved brutal murder of an “ideal” family in an effort to distance himself from his sister’s incarceration for child neglect. As might be expected he discovers a far darker trail of social inequality and the damaging effects of elitism coupled with the legacy of childhood trauma. Review.

Survival family landscaep When all the power suddenly goes off, one ordinary family is forced to flee the city in search of life on the land but how do you cope with the apocalypse when you’re used to 24hr convenience and efficient public services? Hilariously, according to Shinobu Yaguchi’s latest comedy drama, Survival Family. Review.

Another in the long line of movies focussing on samurai who fight with things other than katana, The Flower and the Sword is set in the exciting world of flower arrangement!

hirugao poster A sequel to the hit TV Drama, Hirugao is an old fashioned romantic melodrama in which separated lovers are reunited only to find their love story threatened by forces outside of their control. Review.

Rage Still Lee Sang-il adapts another Shuichi Yoshida novel for three interconnected tales of doubt and suspicion following an unsolved, brutal Tokyo murder in Rage.

in this corner of the world horizontal Award winning animation In this Corner of the World centres on the life of a young woman of Hiroshima towards the end of the war.

Mumon The ninja aren’t up for Oda Nobunaga’s plans to create a peaceful Japan under his control so they’re up to all their secretive tricks in Yoshihiro Nakamura’s epic jidaigeki, Mumon, The Land of Stealth.

After the festival concludes, the Japanese Cultural Centre Toronto will also be screening part II of Chihayafuyu and Midnight Diner during July as well as upcoming anime Hirune Hime: Ancient and the Magic Tablet.

The festival runs at the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre in Toronto from 8th to 28th June, 2017 and you can find more details about all the films, guests, and events on the festival’s official website and keep up with all the latest news via their Facebook page and Twitter feed.