I just wanted to post a quick reminder of this Friday’s Annyong Kimchee screening and lecture on jishu eiga at SOAS, details of which (including directionts) can be found here. It’s one of a number of events leading into the main week of full on Zipangu Fest excitement, and more specifically, cues up another free event taking place during the festival in which I’ll be interviewing this frontrunner of the Japanese indie scene in person, again at SOAS, from 3pm on the afternoon of the Wednesday 24th November. Details of this can be found on this page on the Zipangu Fest website, as can info about screenings of Matsue’s two most recent films, Live Tape and Annyong Yumika.

Tetsuaki Matsue in Conversation at Zipangu Fest, 24th November 2010

All of this, as well as the number of flyers going out around town, should leave you into no doubt that both Matsue and the subject of his exhilarating one-take opus Live Tape, Kenta Maeno, as well as the Chinese harpist Yuki Yoshida, will all be at the festival – you can see all of these guys on stage at Cafe 1001 on the evening of Thursday 25th, plus a screening of Rock Tanjo, Akihiro Murakane’s brilliant documentary on the genesis of Japanese prog rock music in the 1970s, all for a mere fiver. Yes, you read that correctly – two feature-length films and a live set for only five pounds!!! Now where else are you going to get a deal like that anywhere else in London?

Akihiro Murakane’s brilliant rockumentary Rock Tanjo at Cafe 1001, 25th Nov

These aren’t the only guests we’ve got at the first ever Zipangu Fest, but you’ll have to watch this space if you want to find out who else might be coming, or better still, sign up to the Zipangu Fest newsletter. Festival passes are scheduled to go on sale pretty soon, but they’re going to be announced to all our newsletter subscribers first, so if you want to stay ahead of the crowds….

And for those who have just stumbled onto this website with no clue as to what Zipangu Fest is, I’m appending the last press release to this post, and strongly advise you check out the festival website right away!

Press Release -Friday October 29th 2010

London’s premiere festival devoted to Japanese cinema announces programme.

During the sold-out Japanese Halloween Shlockfest Double Bill of RoboGeisha and Big Tits Zombie 3D at London’s Barbican Centre on October 29th, festival director Jasper Sharpannounced the full lineup of the inaugural Zipangu Fest, to be held at various venues across the East End of London from November 23rd to 28th.

Zipangu Fest begins on Tuesday, November 23rd with a special event entitled Nippon Year Zero: Japanese Experimental Film from the 1960s-1970s, presented in collaboration with Close-Up at the Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club. This retrospective programme will introduce audiences to the early Japanese avant-garde filmmaking scene with rare screenings of works by three landmark figures, Donald Richie, Motoharu Jonouchi and Masanori Oe, who captured the zeigeist they were intrinsically a part of, articulating themselves in ways that range from the poetic to the abrasive.

The festival officially gets underway on Wednesday 24th with the Zipangu Fest Opening PARTY @ Café 1001 on Brick Lane, featuring the UK PREMIERE of Pyuupiru 2001 – 2008, Daishi Matsunaga’s moving documentary charting the physical, psychological and artistic metamorphosis of the flamboyant transgender artist Pyuupiru. The evening will also feature a selection of shorts and a screening of Rackgaki – Japanese Graffiti, a documentary examining Japan’s explosive graffiti scene, and concludes with a set from London’s top Japanese DJ ‐Tomoki Tamura + SUPERMETHOD. Tickets for the whole evening cost £5.

The following evening, on Thursday 25th, Zipangu Fest will continue at Café 1001 with the Live Tape ‘Live’ Night @ Café 1001, a musical-themed evening that sees the UK PREMIERES of Rock Tanjo: The Movement 70s, a documentary looking at the birth of ‘New Rock’ in 1970s Japan featuring interviews and performances from bands including the Flower Travellin’ Band, and Live Tape, the award-winning one-take concert film featuring singer-songwriter Kenta Maenothat has been making waves at festivals around the world. OSpecial Festival Guest, Live Tape dTetsuaki Matsue, be in attendance to introduce his film, which will be followed by a live set by Maeno accompanied by Yuki Yoshida on the Chinese Harp. Tickets for the entire evening cost £5.

Friday November 26th sees Zipangu Fest moving to Genesis Cinema in Mile End where our Main Festival Programme begins with Yuriko’s Aroma, Kota Yoshida’s humorous portrait of an aromatherapist besotted by the scent of a sweaty high-schooler, and ends with  the UK Premiere of Gen Takahashi’s epic Confessions of a Dog, a gripping indictment of corruption within the Japanese police, as the CLOSING FILM on Sunday 28 November.

Other UK premieres include Annyong Yumika, an innovative documentary homage to legendary Japanese pink film actress Yumika Hayashi who was mysteriously found dead after returning home from her 35th birthday celebrations, and the second title by Zipangu Fest special guest Tetsuaki Matsue; Love & Loathing & Lulu & Ayano, a revealing drama about exploitation and abuse in Japan’s Adult Video industry, directed by the infamous Hisayasu Sato, who will be in attendance to introduce the film, and Footed Tadpoles, a quirky coming-of-age drama from Tomoya Maeno.

Zipangu Fest is also proud to be presenting a selection of some of the finest in Japanese independent animation. The Ero Guro Mash Up Night features three nightmarishly morbid works in the ‘erotic grotesque’ tradition from the underground animators Hiroshi Harada and Naoyuki Niiya, while Beyond Anime: CALF Animation features recent envelope-pushing works from Mirai Mizue, Kei Oyama, Atsushi Wada and TOCHKA.

Also featuring as part of the main programme are the Zipangu Retro screenings of two classic but very different titles rarely shown in the UK, Children of the Beehive (1948) and NN-891102 (1999). Directed by one of the masters of Japanese cinema, Hiroshi Shimizu, Children of the Beehive relates the journey of a group of war orphans (in real life all orphans taken in and raised by the director) as they are taken under the wing of a nameless soldier and set out across a shattered, postwar landscape in search of a more certain future.  NN-891102, the debut feature by cult hero Go Shibata, depicts a traumatised Nagasaki survivor’s obsession with recreating the sound of the atomic bomb.

Following the festival, a selection of titles from the programme will be screened at the Arnolfini in Bristol, from Thursday 16th – Sunday 16th December. The Arnolfini programme consists of Annyong Yumika, Children of the Beehive, Footed Tadpoles, Live Tape, NN-891102, Confessions of a Dog and a selection of shorts.

Full details and descriptions of the films featured in the Main Festival Programme and other events taking place around the main festival dates can be found on the Zipangu Fest website at: http://zipangufest.com.

Posted at 17:54 on 10 November 2010 Filed under news.

• Tagged
• Annyong Kimchee
• Annyong Yumika
• Cafe 1001
• Kenta Maeno
• Live Tape
• Rock Tanjo
• Tetsuaki Matsue
• Yuki Yoshida
• Zipangu Fest

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Time marches on, with less than a week to go until Zipangu Fest announces its line-up to the world at the Halloween Schlockfest Double Bill this Friday, 29 October, at the Barbican. Tickets are just about sold out for this, although you might be lucky if you get in quick and grab one of the last ones. If you can’t make it, not to worry, as news about the main festival will be posted up here in due course, and no doubt on other sites across the web.

Tetsuaki Matsue's Annyong Kimchee at CUEAFS

In the meantime, I’m pleased to announce that our first pre-festival event, a lecture about jishu eiga by myself followed by a screening of Tetsuaki Matsue’s revealing debut Annyong Kimchee at the Coventry University East Asian Film Society went really well, with a great turnout and an enthusiastic response from all those who came to see it. Thanks to all who came, and also a big thanks to those CUEAFS members who took the time to film and interview me: here’s a video of me talking about the film and the fest from Youtube, with questions being fired at me by the delightful Michelle Bailey.

I’m also really happy to announce that for those who weren’t in Coventry, that I’ll be doing this same “Putting the ‘I’ in Independent” talk and Annyong Kimchee screening in London from 7-9pm, Friday 12 November, at the Brunei Gallery Lecture Theatre in the Russell Square campus for SOAS. Entry is free to anyone who wants to come, and you can find out more details about this here.

Which leads me on to the details of another Zipangu Fest event, this time directly prior to the main festival screenings at Cafe 1001 and the Genesis Cinema. On Tuesday 23 November, we’re collaborating with those legendary guardians of film culture in the East End, Close-Up, to present Nippon Year Zero: Japanese Experimental Film from the 1960s-1970s at the Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club. There’s more details on the Close-Up website here and the Zipangu Fest website here, and Chris Magee at the Toronto J-Film Pow-Wow has also already covered it here.

Masanori Oe's Great Society, screening as part of the Nippon Year Zero event at the Bethnal Green Working Man's Club on 23 November.

We’re really excited about this programme, which showcases the works of three of the great underground/experimental/avant-garde directors of the 1960s, Motoharu Jonouchi, Masanori Oe and Donald Richie – yes, when he wasn’t writing books about Japanese film, Donald Richie made films in Japan, and damn fine ones too! All of the films we’re screening are pretty special, but I’m particularly excited about Oe’s dazzling multi-screen piece of swinging sixties zeitgeist, Great Society – nothing to do with David Cameron’s “Big Society”, mercifully, but a film I’ve been meaning to share more widely ever since I caught it at Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival in 2003. Just a quick note, to say too, if there are any UK programmers or exhibitors who want to make use of these films while the prints are in the country, please drop me a line and we’ll see what we can do.

More news coming later this week, so keep your eye on the Zipangu Fest website …

Posted at 22:58 on 24 October 2010 Filed under news.

• Tagged
• Annyong Kimchee
• Barbican
• Cafe 1001
• Close Up Video
• CUEAFS
• Donald Richie
• Genesis Cinema
• Great Society
• Halloween Schlockfest
• Masanori Oe
• Motoharu Jonouchi
• Nippon Year Zero
• Tetsuaki Matsue
• Zipangu Fest

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Here’s the first wave of titles announced for this year’s Shinsedai Film Festival, for all you lucky folks who are going to be in Toronto or close by this July. I’m basically re-posting the details from the Shinsedai website. There’s more details to be announced in the coming weeks, so keep checking here, or you can join the festival’s Facebook group and follow its Tweets. It’s going to be a great event, as you can read below!

Since our inaugural year in 2009 so many great films have come out of Japan. Shinsedai Cinema Festival co-programmers Jasper Sharp (Midnight Eye) and Chris MaGee (Toronto J-Film Pow-Wow) have spent the past eight months watching as many of these films as humanly possible so that they can bring the best independent, and in many cases under-appreciated, Japanese films to movie audiences here in Toronto. From July 22nd to July 25th, 2010 the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre will be hosting this celebration of Japanese film, and while Sharp and MaGee are still putting the finishing touches on the 2nd annual Shinsedai Cinema Festival line-up we are proud to announce the first block of films that audiences can expect this year at the JCCC.

Live Tape – The Toronto Premiere of Tetsuaki Matsue’s award-winning concert documentary featuring indie singer-songwriter Kenta Maeno. Shot on New Year’s Day 2009 in one single unbroken take Matsue and Maeno take us on a musical tour of Tokyo’s Musashino district. Winner of the top prize in the Japanese Eyes programme at the 2009 Tokyo International Film Festival and the Nippon Digital Award at the 2010 Nippon Connection Japanese Film Festival in Frankfurt.

Kenji Mizoguchi’s The Water Magician – The silent 1933 classic by one of Japan’s most revered directors is also one of Japanese cinema’s very first independently produced films. The love story between a renowned female performer who literally makes water dance across the stage and an impoverished carriage driver will be brought to life with live musical accompaniment by Toronto experimental quartet Vowls. Not to be missed! *Co-presented with the Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival*

Confessions of a Dog – A gritty police epic that exposes the corrupt underbelly of Japanese law enforcement, Gen Takahashi’s Confessions of a Dog was too controversial to receive a theatrical release in Japan. The drama that stars Shun Sugata as a police detective who not only bends the rules but breaks them ended up having to be distributed through Hong Kong to festivals world wide. We are proud to premiere the film in Canada and to have Gen Takahashi as our guest.

Island of Dreams – First time feature director Tetsuichiro Tsuta goes against the trend of shooting on hi-def video with his film Island of Dreams, an homage to 1960s films of Akira Kurosawa, Seijun Suzuki and Kinji Fukasaku. Tsuta and his crew not only shot this eco-thriller on 16mm black-and-white film, but also developed and edited the film entirely by hand.

The Dark Harbour – A hilariously downbeat comedy with a heart, Naito Takatsugu’s The Dark Harbour will be having its Canadian premiere at Shinsedai. The story of a lonely fisherman who discovers a single mother and her son hiding in his closet The Dark Harbour brings to mind the straight-faced comedy of Finnish master Aki Kaurismaki.

The Red Spot – Marie Miyayama’s Japanese/ German co-produced debut feature is a touching drama about a young Japanese woman who travels to Bavaria to search for the exact spot where a car accident took the life of her parents and younger brother 18 years before. What she discovers in Germany is more than just a red spot on a map though.

Different Cities – Experimental video artist Kazuhiro Goshima uses subtle CGI-animation to clear Tokyo of all but a handful of its inhabitants in Different Cities. We follow five inter-weaving characters as they wake up to discover they’ve become lost in their own city.

Yuki Kawamura Trilogy – Musician, video artist, and now filmmaker Yuki Kawamura has crafted three touching Ozu-esque drama’s about the impermamance of life and the magic that can be found in a single moment. Mixing traditional Japanese Noh theatre and modern hi-def technology these three films – Spark, Angel Robe and Grandmother – will be receiving their Toronto premiere at Shinsedai.

Ladybirds’ Requiem – Artist and animator Akino Kondoh’s first short film The Evening Traveling was a huge hit at Shinsedai last year, so this year we’ve not only programmed Kondoh’s second animated short Ladybirds’ Requiem, but we are featuring her 2004 painting Red Fishes as our official poster image. To top it all off Kondoh will be in attendance at this year’s festival.

That’s just a smaple of what audiences can expect this year at the 2nd annual Shinsedai Cinema Festival. Check back on June 17th for the full line-up and schedule of this year’s festival!

Posted at 18:06 on 25 May 2010 Filed under news.

• Tagged
• Akino Kondoh
• Confessions of a Dog
• Island of Dreams
• Kazuhiro Goshima
• Kenji Mizoguchi
• Kenta Maeno
• Live Tape
• Shinsedai
• Tetsuaki Matsue
• Water Magician
• Yuki Kawamura

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