Shinya Tsukamoto will receive Nippon Honor Award at the 19th Nippon Connection Film Festival

Shinya Tsukamoto will receive the NIPPON HONOR AWARD at the 19th Nippon Connection Film Festival in Frankfurt am Main, Germany (May 28th – June 02nd). Shinya Tsukamoto tweeted this news earlier in the month and it has been confirmed by a press release sent out on Tuesday this week. This is the fifth time the award has been bestowed on someone and it goes to a person who has made outstanding contributions to Japanese cinema. I can’t think of a better person at the moment!

Fans of Japanese films who have followed this blog for a while will know I am a big fan of the actor and director, editor and cinematographer. He was one of the first directors I went and wrote a biography for and reviewed a whole bunch of his films (my favourite being Vital). In fact, I met him at the Raindance Independent Film Festival a few years back and had my picture taken with him just before a screening of Fires on the Plain!

Anyway, according to the press release:

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Osaka Asian Film Festival 2019’s Closing Film: Daddy Issues

The closing film of Osaka Asian Film Festival 2019 (March 08th – 17th) has been announced and it is the Vietnamese family comedy Daddy Issues. This is the Japanese premiere of a film directed by Ken Ochiai whose Kyoto-based film Uzumasa Limelight (2014) should be familiar to fans of Japanese cinema – quite appropriate since OAFF 2019’s opening film Randen is set in Kyoto. Most recently, he has been working in the Vietnamese film industry and created a comedy hit with Saigon Bodyguards which was released in 2016 and beat Rogue One in the charts and became the 4th biggest movie of that year.

Osaka Asian Film Festival 2019’s Closing Film: Daddy Issues

The closing film of Osaka Asian Film Festival 2019 (March 08th – 17th) has been announced and it is the Vietnamese family comedy Daddy Issues. This is the Japanese premiere of a film directed by Ken Ochiai whose Kyoto-based film Uzumasa Limelight (2014) should be familiar to fans of Japanese cinema – quite appropriate since OAFF 2019’s opening film Randen is set in Kyoto. Most recently, he has been working in the Vietnamese film industry and created a comedy hit with Saigon Bodyguards which was released in 2016 and beat Rogue One in the charts and became the 4th biggest movie of that year.

Japanese Films at the Berlin International Film Festival 2019

The Berlin International Film Festival launches at the end of this week and runs from February 07th to the 17th. There are a decent number of features and a couple of shorts for fans of Japanese cinema to watch out for. Two of the features seems brand new to me, as in, I haven’t seen it at places like Rotterdam but one was winning major buzz at Sundance last month. The others I have seen at Glasgow. Anyway, here are the Japanese films playing at the festival:

Osaka Asian Film Festival 2019’s Opening Film: “RANDEN: The Comings and Goings on a Kyoto Tram”

The opening film of the 2019 edition of the Osaka Asian Film Festival is Randen: The Comings and Goings on a Kyoto Tram. It is a magical tale of romance amidst the heart of historic Kyoto with the Randen tram’s that runs in the western part of the city uniting a selection of commuters fated to be together. The film will have its World Premiere on Friday, March 8th at Hankyu Umeda Hall.

As mentioned earlier, Randen is a local tram that runs in the west of Kyoto City. It’s a wonderful way to travel between tourist sites like temples and Arashiyama and it is beloved by local people as well as tourists from all over the world. This story depicts the love of three different couples who resonate and echo each other as they are drawn to the Randen trams.

Japanese Films at the Glasgow International Film Festival 2019

The Glasgow Film Festival (February 20th – March 03rd) will launch for its 15th edition in just under a month’s time and there are three Japanese films on offer and one Japan-China co-production. Two of the titles come from Third Window Films and two have not been licensed for the UK as far as I am aware so this might be your best chance to see them.

Here is what is on offer:

Japanese Films at the International Film Festival Rotterdam 2019

The International Film Festival Rotterdam 2018 starts on January 23rd and ends on February 03rd. There are many Japanese titles, nearly all of them being indies and all but two in the Bright Future strand which is dedicated to supporting new artists such as Natsuka Kusano and Koki Tanaka. There is also the Voices strand which is a place for more established directors like Shinya Tsukamoto. The indies towards the end of this post look fascinating.

Here are the films!

Japan Foundation Touring Film Programme 2019 Preview – People Still Call It Love – Passion, Affection and Destruction in Japanese Cinema

The Japan Foundation have announced the details of their next Touring Film Programme and it is full of fantastic films! The tour lasts from February 02nd to March 28th and the theme that connects them all is “love”. The stories address that emotion in a variety of ways through a broad variety of relationships. Love can be found in all shapes and sizes and it can also be an absence. What cannot be denied is that it is a powerful emotion and there are many powerful films that display this.

Amidst the works are stories of couples struggling to relate to each other, a father and his children overcoming differences, brothers and sisters who barely get along, a wife struggling with a husband that has no affection for her, a gay couple who run a law firm who support those on the margins of society and more.

Expect to understand the complexities of Japan, from Tokyo to Osaka and Aguni (an island off Okinawa) and further afield. I’m definitely going to see some of these before I jet off to Japan again.

Here are the films:

Japanese Animation at the London International Animation Festival 2018

The 15th London International Animation Festival (LIAF 18) returns to the Barbican for a run between November 30th and December 09th. There will be ten days of talks, forums, workshops and over 200 animated shorts and features from around the world. For a second year in a row there is a focus on the on-screen and off-screen representation of women in animation with the section Female Figures which will showcase works by female animation talent that explore female desire, physicality, and more. In the centenary since the end of WWI, there is a section called Aftermath which is dedicated to animation inspired or rooted in that conflict. There is also a lot of British talent getting the chance to show their works and there will be lots of independent animation to revel in. Heck, there’s even a film featuring Conan O’Brien! (trailer)

As the organisers have written on their press release,

The Festival promises to inspire, delight and challenge the notion that animation is merely for the 3D blockbuster genre, or cute cartoons. Independent animation is an art form that continues to thrive and develop as a breathtaking medley of styles, materials, techniques and production – from hand drawn, paint on glass, collage, sculpture, to some of the more interesting developments in CGI – all of which can be seen at this year’s LIAF.

I’m interested in everything Japanese so here’s what’s on offer:

Japanese Films at the London East Asian Film Festival 2018

Film fans who love Japanese cinema are spoiled for choice over the next month as Raindance will launch today and we have the BFI London Film Festival with a smattering of Japanese titles and then we have the London East Asian Film Festival.

The organisers announced their programme last week and there will be a lot of films to see from October 25th to November 04th and they have assembled an impressive line-up of titles from over 12 countries including Singapore, South Korea, and more. There are familiar titles from the international festival circuit plus a surprise collaboration with the Nara International Film Festival providing some indies. On a side note, I’ve seen a couple of the non-Japanese films and have even reviewed The Thieves (2012). There is a lot to watch!

Here is the festival’s trailer:

Here are the details: