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1940, Kawamoto Akiko lives in Hiroshima with her father and mother, Genkichi and Shizuko, as well as her two younger brothers. Akiko loves playing her favourite piano. As the war situation worsens, she is busy helping out the war efforts. On the morning of August 6, 1945, she disobeys her father and heads into the centre of town for work. In Hiroshima 75 years later, her favourite piano remains, restored and playable following its survival of the atomic bombing

Animation film celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Senba Center Building. Based on the manga "A manga in the Semba Center Building" by You Machida. One day, manga artist YOU Machida received a request to draw the Semba Center Building, which was celebrating its 50th anniversary. This is the story of a quiet dialogue between a manga artist who has suffered from depression in the past and the Senba Center Building, a generous old commercial facility that has lived for 50 years in the middle of Osaka, over a four-day period.

Restored footage of a famous debate between Yukio Mishima and students at Tokyo University in 1969, just one year before the author's death.

An NHK documentary about the talented actresses who have portrayed the beautiful, intelligent and resourceful heroines of the long running series. Features interviews with Kumi Mizuno, Keiko Mari, Yumiko Shaku, and Megumi Odaka. Also featured are never before seen 8mm home movies shot by producer Tomoyuki Tanaka on the sets of classic Toho films.

Trailblazing artists, activists, and everyday people from across the spectrum of gender and sexuality defy social norms and dare to live unconventional lives in this kaleidoscopic view of LGBTQ+ culture in contemporary Japan.

During World War II, many Japanese immigrants in Santos, Brazil, were forced to move to another place. Matsubayashi draws attention to the fact that 60% of the immigrants were from Okinawa. Based on testimonies from interviewees, this film reveals the hidden historical relationship between Okinawa and Brazil.

A thorough account of the process to make Weathering with You. The crew appears to have been given unfettered access to the production allowing for a great walk through something we rarely see, production of an anime feature. From first audition of the voice actors, to cast and crew working with the director, to the animation process like compositing, background, temp work, 3D modelling, computer animation, to production meetings, to working on the songs with RADWIMPS, to finally the promotional tour of the final film this documentary covers every step.

An omnibus film consisting of 4 short films and a documentary related to COVID-19.

Behind-the-scenes of Shōjo☆Kageki Revue Starlight 3rd StarLive "Starry Diamond" concert.

The first documentary for Japanese idol group Hinatazaka46.

Norihito works for a company that cleans the homes of the deceased alone. The lonely deaths he encounters push him to confront his own past, but this effort also leads to unexpected new problems. Elder Muramatsu, on the other hand, lives his life in silence in social isolation. The upcoming Sakura Festival creates hope to change his destiny. Will he find a reason to exist in the world?

Keyakizaka46's first documentary film.

Cenotes—sources of water that in ancient Mayan civilization were said to connect the real world and the afterlife. The past and present of the people living in and around them intersect, and distant memories echo throughout immersive scenes of light and darkness.

Documentary by film director Isshin Inudo on three generations of the Nomura family of the Izumi school of Kyogen: Mansaku Nomura (89), Mansai (54), and Yuki (20). Summer of 2020. Yuki is to play an important role in the future of Kyogen. He will play four roles in "Nasu Yoichi Narrative". His father Mansai and grandfather Mansaku continue to rehearse. Mansai, as artistic director of the theater, is searching for the performing art of the Corona disaster for the sake of his family. Mansaku talks about his current state of mind in light of the hardships he endured during the war. And then, Hiroki's big day arrives. What is in store? This is a new documentary that makes the most of the 8K capabilities to convey the physical presence of each of the three generations and the details of their movements.

A Japanese-produced theatrical documentary about José Alberto Mujica Cordano.

During WWII, the Japanese army developed experimental balloons able to cross the Pacific Ocean and reach the West Coast of North America in 3-6 days. Armed with explosives, they were given the code name fu-go, or fusen bakudan (“fire balloons,” or balloon bombs) in an attempt to instill a culture of fear like that caused by the far more deadly American firebombing of Japanese cities. The U.S. responded by enacting a censorship campaign, requesting newspapers avoid reports of fu-go landings or sightings. Living near the remains of a fu-go launch site in Fukushima Prefecture, Takeuchi mimics their flight take-off using a drone camera, and, traveling to North America, follows their arrival across the shoreline and rural landscapes, using a bat’s echolocation as narrative device to place fu-go and Fukushima as echos across history.

Rolling along on a bike or floating in a doctor’s office’s seasonal hamster display, Wheel Music explores the aesthetic feeling and social character of Sendagi, an old town in Tokyo under urban development in preparation for the planned Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics.

After being alienated from her child in the aftermath of her divorce, a Filipino-Japanese mother finds she is not alone on her journey to be reunited with her son. She faces up to her own demons and joins a global generational cause – the right of all children to be loved by both parents.

There are as many births and child delivery stories as there are people. Despite all the progress of medicine and science, it still happens that lives get lost during childbirth. On such a daily and common matter, we want to interview mothers on their intimate experience of giving birth, and adapt that material into animation to have it seen by audiences of all generations. This is a documentary animation on the very beginning and the mystery of life, told from the point of view of mothers.

A city person discovers twelve paths with a different sense of time. What makes us come alive? Will we go on the same way?

Nobuyoshi Kikuchi has devoted his life to books. Over the course of his career, he has designed more than 15,000 book covers. Even in the digital age, he still works with a ruler, scissors, and pencils, creating unique fonts, and being meticulous about the properties of the chosen paper. He enjoys the personal exchange with authors, a good cup of coffee, and a stroll through the flea market. Nanako Hirose presents a fascinating portrait of a seemingly old-fashioned personality – but maybe it is exactly this kind of personality which can give an inspiration to reflect on the really valuable things in life?

After mysterious notes found at Auschwitz are discovered to be written by the Sonderkommando, a unit of Jewish prisoners tasked with guiding other prisoners to the gas chambers, experts look into the lives of these prisoners labelled as traitors.

Dr. Kazuo Hasegawa, 90, recently revealed that he is suffering from dementia. A pioneer in dementia research, Dr. Hasegawa had devoted his life to the field, establishing the Hasegawa Dementia Scale. This year-long record follows Dr. Hasegawa in his daily life, exploring ways to live with the disease and offering reasons for hope.

V6's 25th anniversary live tour

It took Kaori Sakagami six years to receive permission for shooting her documentary in a Japanese prison. In a unique project, a limited number of inmates can participate in a therapeutic circle in order to understand the mental and social conditions of their behavior. Even after being released from prison, former inmates are supported by psychologists and social workers. What is remarkable in the process: the inmates learn to support each other and to open up toward the experiences of others.

The documentary follows RADWIMPS on their long tour from last year, which saw them play 20 shows in 11 cities across Japan. It includes rehearsal and backstage footage, as well as the band interacting with the artists that joined them across the 2019 tour. The DVD and Blu-ray will feature 23 songs which includes the guest performance from Aimyon for Nakidashisodayo, a song by RADWIMPS which she features on. It also includes a documentary of the tour, as well as guest appearances from artists who joined the band on stage including Miyachi, Titan Zombies, Taka from ONE OK ROCK, and Toko Miura. RADWIMPS are set to embark on an all-new tour starting this March. Titled “KONNICHIWA NIPPON TOUR 2020,” it will take them to seven cities in Japan for 10 showsーincluding four dome venues.

November 19, 2019-January 2, 2020 We covered Hong Kong during the democratization movement. Junior high school students, University students, Musicians, Designers, Politician, Former police officer, Democrat, Office worker Why do they fight?

The work contains Butoh works and methods by Tomoe Shizune in omnibus format. It will be re-edited and published based on what was provided as the text for the Butoh course at the Grotowski Institute, Poland by Tomoe Shizune & Hakutobo, 2018. The Grotowski Institute is engaged in a wide range of research related to physical expression, as well as physical training based on the research of the prominent Polish director Jeray Grotowski (1933-1999) who founded the experimental theater "Teatr Laboratorium" in 1959. The coaction between Tomoe's music and Butoh is highlight.

In the sound of the historic building, Port Opening Memorial Hall, the overlapping tone of the band formation with percussion Ryota Tanaka and guitar Gen Tanabe became a performance that felt a certain heat with the new wind. A new song "some site" written for this day is also included, and it will be released for the first time in this work. Following Kanata, Rinko Kawauchi is on the jacket. Beautiful photographs of the sun moving to the endless sea, shining a faint light and disappearing all the boundaries , gently snuggle up to this album.

Besides being an excellent showcase of Chiaki Mayumura's talents, this film is a brilliant melding of documentary and fiction.

A child is a blessing. You love the child. And it’s sometimes therefore that you feel suffocated. The film is a collection of real-life moments of moms and their partners struggling, stumbling, and fighting to make it work.

Joso (josō 女装) is a film collaboration combining anthropology and art film to explore the nature of male reaction and sentiment on the cusp of transformation in contemporary Japan.

This work has been long-awaited as a masterpiece which is not performed in public since it was staged 31 years ago in 1989. This valuable video will be recorded in full and will be released for the first time. The story of a seed that fell to one point on the stage, and a tree that grew bravely and dignifiedly there. Amid the sounds of Tomoe Shizune’s exquisitely beautiful Guitar piece, the dancers’ bodies overflow with life and love of nature.

Over the course of the summer until her graduation, with changes she can't control but also being protected by the mochi which looks over important times, Yuna, a 15-year old student begins to change so that she will not forget.

Follows architect Kazuyo Sejima's design and the construction of a new building at Osaka University of the Arts

Inspired by the tranquility of public television programs in Japan (NHK TV) and accompanied by the meditative music of Brian Eno, The God-Building Theory is an educational video about the aesthetics of Russian Cosmism: a philosophy of technological immortality and resurrection that emerged in Russia at the end of the 19th century, which is the main subject of Anton Vidokle’s films.

Seeking their best "sound" is why people gather into a small jazz cafe BASIE nowhere in the world at Ichinoseki, North East county in Japan. It seems a sanctuary for global jazz players, fans, and audio maniacs. Filming BASIE owner Sugawara Shoji tuning a 50-year-old JBL speaker everyday, stock footage became more than 150 hours.

The 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami destroyed large parts of the small town of Rikuzentakata. Here, Hiromi ABE hosts a radio show in which she reports on local events and interviews the residents. She focuses not only on the time after the disaster and the ongoing rebuilding of the community, but also on recording personal stories.

A documentary about the people of Hirono, a city located 20 km away from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. Immediately after the Great East Japan Earthquake, the whole town was forced to evacuate. In 2019, 80% of the population at the time of the earthquake is back in town.

Although sumo is a cherished part of Japanese culture, few have managed to get a behind-the-scenes look at the sport. Director Eiji SAKATA had the opportunity to spend six months in close contact with two sumo stables. In the process, he managed to capture fascinating footage of the rigorous training sessions and daily life of the wrestlers.

Just prior to entering her long professional career, Kaede Hatashima discards her masculine form and comes out to society as a transgender woman. In the brief respite between graduate school and her new job as an architect, she tests her wings as a woman for the first time. Through competing in a beauty contest and by giving lectures, Kaede gains attention as a gifted and talented transgender woman. While in the media spotlight, she seeks an active role in expanding the prospects for other trans people. Internally, however, Kaede cannot shake the self-image of a son rejected by his father, which remains with her from childhood. An ambitious trans woman aiming for social achievement and a son secretly wishing to be loved and recognized. Grappling with these two identities, what kind of woman will Kaede design?

This is the story of a deaf photographer who has always chosen to see rather than hear. He encounters “song”, and explores it, marries his deaf partner and fathers a hearing child. One day, a lullaby slips through his lips and his life is changed forever.

who are you... I travel... A wanderer... A stranger... A founder... A questioner... Like you... or... ?

Yoshida is a “tears teacher.” A firm believer that weekly crying promotes healthier living, he’s made it his mission to make more people weep.

The scratched and faded – and at times almost abstracted – home movies that pass through the projector in Tetsuya Maruyama's "Shashin no Ma" simultaneously welcome and resist nostalgia, in what is both a meditation on the physical nature of the analogue film strip and the ghosts that reside within it as well as a poignant tribute by an artist-filmmaker son to his amateur-filmmaker father.

About Japanese shota comics and the people who read, draw and love them.

What keeps popular policies of social welfare from the seat of power? Over nearly two decades, Arata Oshima follows a politician navigating splintered opposition parties in a landscape dominated by the right-wing.

This is a documentary about Japanese GID / GD / Transgender people and the problems they face in their daily life. In Japan, in 2004, the Gender Identity Disorders Special Cases Act was enacted, allowing people to change their legal sex if they met certain requirements. However, many of them still struggle to change their sex, as the requirements are very restrictive and difficult to meet.

8mm experimental film directed by Minoru Shinojima. Shot and edited by Kenji Onishi. For 40 years, Minoru Shinojima has been opposed to mining Mt. Buko and is striving to protect the natural environment and cultural ground that inhabit the local area. Idomu’s Testament - Sequel or IDOMU II. In Saitama prefecture Chichibu city there’s a mountain which was most loved by Tokugawa Ieyasu (founder of Tokugawa shogunate). It is Mount Buko, which rose 2 hundred million years ago when the pacific plate moved the underwater volcanoes around Hawaii. It is like the giant turtle shell where Myouken bodhisattva stood. A gentle mountain which heals people’s hearts and gives them the blessings of green and water.

Takashi Murakami takes us through what led him to cancel work on Jellyfish Eyes 2

Tobishima used to be a prosperous sea transportation hub in the Sea of Japan, but now it is a quiet island with a small and aging population. The only junior high school student in the island will graduate this year, and his school, Tobishima Elementary and Junior High School, will be closed at the end of this school year. This film captures the daily lives of the various people living on Tobishima and follows the activities of those who are struggling to maintain the community and connect the island to the future while facing the harsh reality of the situation.

Black kites soar on thermals along the Kamo river in Kyoto. Flags billow. Cacti spin. Plum trees blossom. Pigeons make love atop a clock. Friends chat by the riverside. Filmed February/March 2019 on a single 40 year old cartridge of Kodachrome Super 8 and hand-developed in Caffenol. The film was heavily fogged, but there are some (real) images.