Peckham, the day after the riots

Back to the riots. Well, I don’t intend to add too much to the endless debate and conjecture about what has caused them, who is responsible etc, because this is a subject that has already been knocked about considerably in the nation’s media over the past few days, and it will no doubt dominate the national discourse for the rest of the year, at the very least. Besides, I don’t think I could put things much better than Seumus Milne in yesterday’s ‘These riots reflect a society run on greed and looting’ article in The Guardian, or the ‘Panic on the streets of London’ piece on Penny Red’s blogspot from Tuesday. I include these links mainly to record them for posterity, as something to look back on in the future when we’ve had a chance to get a little more perspective. Personally, my own feelings are whatever the ‘explanations’ for the huge amount of criminal damage that has been caused by the rioters, no one is ever going to convince me as to their justification.

A crime scene reconstruction in Lego of the Gregg's conflagration by my friend's 8-year old daughter

On my daily walks down Rye Lane in Peckham these past few mornings, I can’t help but think about the sheer pointlessness of the damage, the utterly emptiness of the gesture. If this was an act of defiance from a disenfranchised generation, then it was a pretty pathetic one and aimed in totally the wrong direction. Peckham is hardly the wealthiest community in London. Rye Lane already has its fair share of empty shop premises, with numerous others in the process of holding closing-down or liquidation sales. The street’s most iconic local pub, The Hope, closed a few months back and has now been replaced as a betting shop – oh the irony! The rest of the street mainly consists of privately owned African or Caribbean grocery stores or, in the case of Rye Lane’s major casualty on Monday, an off licence situated next to Gregg’s Bakery, now being demolished after it was completely gutted by fire. The looters were reduced to pilfering from stores such as Poundland, Poundstretchers, Mighty Pound, 99p Stores and Primark. It would be funny if it wasn’t so tragic, the sheer banality of evil.

Messages of peace and solidarity on the boarded up window of Poundland in Rye Lane, a scene that provoked a surprising emotional response in me

Still, out of the ashes, something positive already seems to be emerging, a more genuine sense of community spirit, a refusal to let the area be destroyed from rogue elements within. I’m certain Peckham will bounce back, although the detour I now have to take through the council estates round the back of Rye Lane while taking my son to his nanny do demonstrate what many have already pointed out in the media – that for all this talk about ‘Big Society’ motivating the government spending cuts, a complete different world seems exists outside of the daily experience of so many of us, where people live in cramped little estates with no money, no education, no jobs, no hope. One wonders how what is allegedly one of the richest countries in the world ever allowed things to come to this.

The sheer randomness of the devastation was brought home to movie fans with the news of the destruction of the Sony/Pias distribution warehouse in Enfield, North London, about which I tweeted news from Gigwise and The Guardian back on Tuesday and Screen Daily the next morning. The warehouse, owned by the UK’s largest independent home entertainment distributor, Pias, was razed to the ground, and with it the entire stock of a large number of DVD labels – and not major labels, but the kind of independent companies that, without which, the UK film market would be a desert: Arrow Films, the British Film Institute, Dogwoof, Artificial Eye, Palisades Tartan…

Sony distribution warehouse fire. Photograph: Luke Macgregor/Reuters

Among these I’d like to offer my particular condolences to Terracotta Distribution and Third Window Films, two tiny labels run by friends of mine, Joey Leung and Adam Torel respectively, without whom the UK film scene would be an infinitely poorer place. These aren’t big companies; these are one man enterprises operating on a lot of love and not a lot of capital, releasing films they believe in and actively engaging with their audiences through events such as the Terracotta Far East Film Festival and East Winds: A Third Window Festival – Joey kindly let us have Terracotta’s Big Tits Zombie 3D for our Zipangu Fest Halloween Schlockfest double bill last year, while Adam gave us Confessions of a Dog for our closing film of the festival. Also Eureka have similarly been a wonderful energising force for me, with their brilliant releases of Japanese classics through their Masters of Cinema label, and Dogwoof too have built up an impressive roster of cutting edge documentaries that have spread beyond their niche markets and enriched the wider political discourse in Britain. And let us not also forget the large number of indie music labels who have similarly suffered immense losses due to this one incident. Let us pray the perpetrator of this arson attack is brought to justice as soon as possible.

Small distribution companies like these already have the odds stacked against them in the UK due to the deeply-ingrained winner-takes-all economic imbalances of the country’s entertainments market, the lack of support from the mainstream media, and the hefty premium required by the BBFC just to get films into distribution in the first place. Regardless of whether the substantial losses of the stock from all of these companies will be covered by their insurance or not, the biggest problem they all face at the moment is one of cashflow. To get a better idea of the problems facing small distributors such as these, check out this post on Third Window’s Facebook page – Basically once their stock that is already in stores across the country or held by online retailers runs out, that’s it – there’s nothing to replace it until they manufacture more units, which in itself is a costly business.

Third Window Film's release of Villain (Akunin) opens at the ICA next week

So I wish to end this post by adding my voice to the chorus of support for these companies, and in particular urge you to go to and see Third Window’s latest release of Villain (Akunin) when it opens in London next Friday at the ICA. There’s a lot more details about all this and how you can help in John Berra’s ‘Support Independent Distributors of Asian Cinema Following UK Riots’ article for VCinemashow and this post on Podcast on Fire, but basically it all boils down to this: show them you care by ordering their films from Amazon, or watching them online on Mubi.com. Don’t let the riots destroy our outlets for quality independent cinema.

Here are some links:

Third Window’s Amazon store

Third Window and Terracotta films available online at Mubi.com posted by Martin Cleary at New Korean Cinema.

Right, I’m off to Amazon to pick up my Cold Fish BluRay…

Neil Cantwell and Tim Grabham's remarkable new documentary Kanzeon

There’s another great line-up at the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre this July, high points of which include Catcher On the Shore, the directorial debut of 14-year-old Okinawan boy, Ryugo Nakamura (yes, you did read that correctly: 14-year-old!!!), a rare screening of Torajiro Saito’s 1935 Shochiku Kamada comedy Kid’s Commotion starring “the Japanese Charlie Chaplin” Shigeru Ogura and presented with a live Foley sound effects accompaniment and demonstration by Goto Koyama (this is going to be amazing!), and the world premiere of Kanzeon, a stunning new British documentary about Buddhism and music (actually it’s about a whole lot more than that, but it’s sort of difficult to explain – check out the official website). Oh yes, and there’s some other old favourites we screened in London as part of last year’s Zipangu Fest, including the CALF animation programme and Mean-eater Mountain.

Catcher on the Shore, by 14-year-old filmmaking prodigy Ryugo Nakamura

We’re also closing the festival with Yuya Ishii’s Sawako Decides, one of the titles that did the rounds of the UK as part of the Japan Foundation UK’s touring programme earlier this year. If you didn’t catch it in Britain, or if you want to see it again, you’ll be happy to hear that it’s been picked up for distribution byThird Window Films, and will be out in theatres from 8 July, with a DVD to follow. Anyway, I’m not going to go into too much detail about the programme here, other than to cut and paste some of the highlights from Chris’ page, but suffice it to say, its another goodie for Torontonians, so if you’re in the city at the end of July, don’t miss…

I unfortunately won’t be at Shinsedai this year due to scheduling conflicts with another very special film event that is occurring on the other side of the world (well, almost…) in Poland, which I’ll do my utmost to shed some light on before the week is out.

In the meantime, here’s the lowdown on this year’s Shinsedai:

OPENING NIGHT FILM: Hospitalité (dir. Koji Fukuda, 2010)

A sly, humorous and insightful satire of contemporary a Japanese family and the secrets they keep from each other that begins as an homage to the classic domestic dramas of Yasujiro Ozu, but ends up in the comic territory of Tampopo director Juzo Itami.

Sly satire from Koji Fukuda, Hospitalité

HORROR FEATURE: Shirome (dir. Koji Shiraishi, 2010)

Koji Shiraishi, director of “Occult” and the controversial “Grotesque”, revitalizes the J-Horror genre with a mockumentary that combines the low-budget scares of The Blair Witch Project and American Idol instant stardom into an entirely unique and chilling experience.

Blair Witch Project meets The X-Factor, in Koji Shiraishi's Shirome

CENTERPIECE SCREENING: Wandering Home (dir. Yoichi Higashi, 2010)

Tadanobu Asano gives a career defining performance as real-life photojournalist Yutaka Kamoshida as he struggles to overcome alcoholism. Far from being a journey into the underbelly of addiction “Wandering Home” is a life-affirming drama filled with love, gentle humour and reconciliation.

Tadanobu Asano stars in Wandering Home

FAMILY FEATURE: Azemichi Road (dir. Fumie Nishikawa, 2009)

“Azemichi Road” takes the classic underdog genre and gives it new life. Yuki, a young deaf girl, takes a journey from silence to acceptance through her involvement in an amateur dance troupe. Film-maker Fumie Nishikawa sets her feel-good kids film in the gorgeous landscapes of Japan’s countryside.

Fun for all the family, Azemichi Road

SILENT CLASSIC: Kid Commotion (dir. Torajiro Saito, 1935)

The Shinsedai Cinema Festival is very proud to present a special screening of Torajiro Saito’s “Kid Commotion”, starring Japan’s answer to Charlie Chaplin Shigeru Ogura as a harried father, with the accompaniment of live sound effects provided by foley artist Goro Koyama. Audiences will not only have a chance to see a very rare and very funny silent film, but will have the opportunity to learn about the art of movie sound effects.

Vintage Japanese slapstick, Kid's Commotion, presented with a very unusual accompaniment!

CLOSING NIGHT FILM: Sawako Decides (dir. Yuya Ishii, 2010)

Director Yuya Ishii’s return to the Shinsedai Cinema Festival, “Sawako Decides” is the hilarious story of a young woman (actress Hikari Mistushima) who returns to her home town to care for her ailing father and to straighten out her life after a series of low-paying jobs and less than ideal boyfriends.

Soon to go on theatrical release in the UK, Sawako Decides is Shinsedai's Closing Night Screening

Where: Warwick Arts Centre, Gibbet Hill Road, Coventry, West Midlands, CV4 7AL

When: Fri 11–Sun 13 Feb 2011

Tickets: Per screening: £6.60; students £4.30; Warwick Students and CUEAFS members £3.00. Also available: Festival ticket at £20 for 4 films (inc booking fees). Contact the Box Office on 024 7652 4524, or visit the Warwick Arts Centre website.

From February 11th to 13th 2011, Third Window Films in conjunction with the Coventry University East Asian Film Society present East Winds: A Third Window Film Festival.

“Our goal is to raise awareness of Asian cinema to a university crowd who might normally not have much chance to catch Asian cinema on the big screen. With a 220-seater cinema, cheap ticket prices and a variety of films from all over Asia being shown, Third Window Films and CUEAFS hope you can all enjoy a new type of cinema and let us help you explore a window to the East!”

The East Winds facebook page is here. I’m going to be present to conduct a few onstage interviews, as detailed in this blog post.

The festival coincides with a two-day international symposium Asian Exposure: East Asian Cinema in a Global Context held at Coventry University on February 11-12.

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And now comes the news the even Coventry is about to get its own dedicated Asian film festival in the form of East Winds: A Third Window Film Festival. As if the title wasn’t enough to give things away, this event at the Warwick Arts Centre is the initiative of Adam Torel, head honcho and Lupin-lookalikey behind the UK distributor Third Window Films, while the venue is a dead give-away as to the involvement of Spencer Murphy and the folks at the Coventry University East Asian Film Society, or CUEAFS.

Confessions, the latest from Kamikaze Girls and Memories of Matsuko director Tetsuya Nakashima, up for release from Third Window Films very soon

As Adam writes on his website “Our goal is to raise awareness of Asian cinema to a university crowd who might normally not have much chance to catch Asian cinema on the big screen.” Its a great line-up too. That old favourite from the Third Window back catalogue, Memories of Matsuko, soon to be released on Blu-Ray, paves the way for one of the company’s latest acquisitions, Confessions, the most recent offering from director Tetsuya Nakashima – this film is out on DVD and Blu-Ray in the UK on 25 April. I’ll be up on stage too, to conduct a Q&A with the composer of both films, Gabriele Roberto, and with Gen Takahashi, following the screening of his Confessions of a Dog, one of my faves of last year following its screenings at Toronto’s Shinsedai and my own Zipangu Fest, even though it was originally made some five years before – Third Window are putting out the DVD on 11 March, but before then, if you can’t make it to Coventry, then pop down to the ICA on 16 February and I’ll be conducting the onstage Q&A with Takahashi-san then too.

Cold Fish - Nobody does it like Sion Sono

The other exciting film Japanese film on the programme is the widely-praised Cold Fish, the serial killer epic from Love Exposure director Sion Sono. I have to confess I’ve not seen this yet, but Third Window Films have just announced this is coming up for a wider UK release later this year, though I’m not sure of the exact dates. There’s a Korean film too, in the form of Kick the Moon, another from Adam’s back catalogue (get the DVD here), while Spencer’s presence manifests itself in the inclusion of one Chinese film, and the only actual UK premiere, Kuo-fu Chen & Qunshu Gao’s 2009 wartime drama The Message. Gao is coming over for the festival, and participating in a Q&A after the screening. I don’t know much about this film, but it looks pretty beautiful from the stills, and Chinese cinema is always an intriguing prospect.

The beautiful-looking wartime drama from China, The Message

Ticket prices are very reasonable: £6.60 for normal people; students £4.30; Warwick Students and CUEAFS members £3.00, while a festival ticket at £20 for 4 films (inc booking fees) is also available – worth travelling some distance for, I’d say. The Warwick Arts Centre is on the campus of the University of Warwick, so have a look at the website for further instructions on how to get there.

Whilst we’re praising Adam’s fine release roster, I’ll end with the news that Third Window Films have also just picked up Yuya Ishii’s Sawako Decides, the most recent of the films included as part of the upcoming Japan Foundation tour and one I’d have chosen for Zipangu Fest, had Tony Rayns not grabbed it for London Film Festival first.

Hikari Mitsushima, Third Window favourite and star of Love Exposure and Kakera as you've never seen her before, in a scene from Yuya Ishii's Sawako Decides

Here’s a link to an interview with Mr Torel that the Twitch website has just put up recently.

The kind of images Blu-Ray was invented for - a shot from Kenneth Anger's 1954 film Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome

Well my mind was certainly changed over the past year. I’ve recently been savouring a number of UK released disks that really benefit from the bright colours and sharp images the format permits – so much so that I’m wondering if I could ever go back to DVD again. The first of these was the BFI’s wonderful release of The Magick Lantern Cycle, the complete works of experimental filmmaker and Aleister Crowley nut Kenneth Anger. Anger might be best known to many for his two wonderful Hollywood Babylon books, which dig the dirt on the various scandals that beset Tinseltown in its early years, but if you’ve never seen such films as The Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954), Scorpio Rising (1963) or Lucifer Rising (1972) then, boy, I suggest you get your hands on this while you can. The RRP is £36.99, but I got mine from Amazon UK for £12.99, and its currently listed at £9.19. These luridly bizarre 16mm occult workouts look startling on Blu-Ray – you can see the very grain and texture of the film stock, its the closest one will ever get to seeing these films as they were meant to be seen, projected from film. Moreover, you also get a nice thick booklet about Anger and his films, and a fascinating feature-length documentary Anger Me (2006) about his fascinating life following in the path of the Beast, working at the Cinémathèque Française during the 1950s, and hobnobbing with such luminaries as Mick Jagger.

Kenneth Anger's homage to Aleister Crowley, Invocation of My Demon Brother (1969) - the title alone should be enough to make you want to see this!

It seems to me, as DVD once did, that Blu-Ray is really best suited to experimental film, and top of my want list now is a UK release of the films of Stan Brakhage. Criterion put out their 687 minute release By Brakhage: Anthology 1 & 2, but I assume this must be region 1 coded, so no good for my current set up. Oh well, we can live in hope that the BFI will look into getting this out on the market before the coalition government’s cuts debilitate this hallowed institution too much.

Rage Net (1988), by Stan Brakhage - if anyone wants to put out a Region 2 Blu-Ray of Brakhage's films, I'm with you all the way

In the meantime, I’ll point you to another great BFI release that might have passed you by, which looks similarly impressive on Blu-Ray, which is Winstanley, a real oddity from 1975 co-directed by revered British film historian Kevin Brownlow and Andrew Mollo. Based on an obscure episode in English history shortly after the Civil War, it portrays a renegade group of known as the Diggers, led by Gerrard Winstanley, and their attempts to leave the system by claiming a patch of common land to live on and cultivate for themselves – Britain’s earliest Communists, as you might, whose Reclaim-the-Streets / Grow-Your-Own ethos seems particularly appealing in these times of inflated banker’s bonuses, VAT hikes and public sector layoffs. Brownlow and Mollo also made It Happened Here (1964), about a hypothetical Nazi Occupation of England during the war, although this is only available on DVD. My advice though, to film fans and especially filmmakers, Go Watch Winstanley! This is the perfect example of what independent filmmaking should be. The film is an aesthetic masterpiece, with some beautiful English landscapes shot in wonderful high-contrast 16mm monochrome, demonstrating that just because you’ve got no money, it doesn’t mean you can’t make a gorgeous looking film. Secondly, something so many independent filmmakers seem to forget nowadays – this film is actually ABOUT something. It was made because it says something its makers thought needed saying, not because they just wanted to make a film for the sake of making a film, which seems to be the predominant attitude with most wannabe filmmakers at the moment.

The true independent spirit - Winstanley (1975)

Another film that looks absolutely beautiful on Blu-Ray is Sean Penn’s Into the Wild (2007), one of those films that was widely praised by critics when it came out, but now seems to have faded into memory, and it’s only 4 years old – Amazon have also got this at a knockdown price at the moment, at only £7.99. For the record, I think this portrayal of a young man’s attempt to sever himself from the ties of society and completely absorb himself in nature is one of the best films of the past decade. It’s beautifully acted, but the cinematography is the real star here, with the American landscape from the deserts of Arizona to the wilderness of Alaska shot so beautifully they become essentially the main characters in the film. I could happily keep this disk on all the time in my living room, as moving wallpaper.

Sean Penn's astonishing Into The Wild (2007), one of my favourite films of the last decade looking beautiful on Blu-Ray

This film would make an ideal companion piece to Werner Herzog’s masterful documentary, Grizzly Man (2005), one of the five films included on the Encounters in the Natural World Blu-Ray Boxset, alongside the surreal Antarctic antics of the 2007 title film and one of the directors most hypnotically bizarre, White Diamond (2004). Amazon currently have this down from £54.99 to £16.39, and christ, this was easily the best purchase I made last year. Utterly compelling.

Antartica from underneath - one of the least bizarre scenes from Werner Herzog's jaw-dropping Encounters in the Natural World (2007)

Moving on into more whimsical territory, a quick heads-up on a forthcoming Blu-Ray release which you might be interested in, Third Window Film’s upcoming upgrade of Tetsuya Nakashima’s much-loved Memories of Matsuko (2006), one of the best Japanese releases of the last ten years and a film whose eye-popping colours are sure to be well-serviced by the Blu-Ray format. The extra disk space hasn’t been wasted either – one of the special features is me interviewing the composer Gabriele Roberto, in which you can find out how an Italian musician came to be in Tokyo writing soundtracks for Japanese films.

Third Window Films enters the Blu-Ray market, with the upcoming release of Memories of Matsuko, featuring an interview with composer Gabriele Roberto by me

And this takes me finally to a batch of films put out by Eureka last year. I’ve said it many times before, and I’ll say it again, but the Masters of Cinema Blu-Ray-only release of Shohei Imamura’s Profound Desires of the Gods was the home-viewing highpoint of 2010, and probably the previous couple of years too. You can read my review of the film on Midnight Eye for why I think this is, but for I wanted to say that for those who felt left out by this Blu-Ray exclusive, 2011 offers some great news – it’s also coming out on DVD in a couple of weeks.

I can't praise this film enough. Shohei Imamura's Profound Desires of the Gods, on BluRay only last year, now coming to 2010

This is the same story for a number of other Eureka releases too, some of which I will cover in due course either on Midnight Eye or this website. Basically, the Blu-Rays of Kon Ichikawa’s The Burmese Harp, FW Murnau’s City Girl, Frank Tashlin’s Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? and Leo McCarey’s Make Way for Tomorrow are all coming out on DVD very soon, so if you don’t have a Blu-Ray player yet, you’ll still get a chance to watch them, and if you do – well, take advantage while they’re going cheap on Amazon!

Murnau's City Girl (1930), one of the Nosferatu/Faust/Sunrise/Tabu director's best, according to many of those in the know

By the way, I’d like this site to be as much a forum for discussion about films as me thrusting my own views, opinions and tastes upon you, so if you’ve any DVD or Blu-Ray recommendations of your own, don’t be afraid to chime in.

After a sold out screening of Nippon Year Zero last night at the Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club, the festival proper kicks off today, and the opening party is a double bill of RackGaki and Pyuupiru 2001-2008 at Cafe 1001, with a selection of shorts screened between them, followed by a live set by DJ Tomoki Tamura + SUPERMETHOD.

On Thursday, following a screening of Live Tape at Cafe 1001, we are delighted to present Live Tape Star Kenta Maeno’s Live Set! The performance, which will be Maeno’s first ever in the UK, will see the Live Tape star Kenta Maeno accompanied by Yuki Yoshida on the niko (Chinese harp).

Live Tape 'Live' in London!

And if that wasn’t enough, on Saturday we’re having a house party! We’ll be playing an eclectic mix of Japanese themes in pop, rock, folk, disco, house and techno from 3 of our favourite musical acts! DJ Adam Torel (big boss at Third Window Films) will be bringing his box of vinyl to spin some old Japanese pop, Live Tape star Kenta Maeno accompanied by Yuki Yoshida on the niko (Chinese harp) will play rock and folk (Maeno is known as the Bob Dylan of Japan, after all) and Holic’s DJ Tomoki Tamura + Rhythm Factory’s DJ SUPERMETHOD will take us into the morning with deep disco, tech house and techno. The party is at Designers Block in Hoxton and kicks off at 9pm. There will be some interesting stuff happening on the venue’s upstairs screen too!

All the parties offer the opportunity to hobnob with festival guests; we don’t believe in VIP areas.

Details of all these events can be found at http://zipangufest.com/

Moriro Miyamoto's intriguing sounding Butt Boat hits London's East End

There’s something else on Saturday I wanted to draw your attention to however, which is totally unconnected with both this event and our own ZipanguFest, yet is happening around the same area.This is a screening of an indie film called Butt Boat (Shirifune) at the Cafe Oto, 18 – 22 Ashwin street, Dalston, from 7.30pm followed by a live set from Sobameshi & Porno  and a DJ set from Bo Ningen.

The event has been organised by Improvica, a new initiative aimed at bringing Japanese music and film to the UK by Yuhi Nakano, or in their own words “Improvica record label is London’s unrivaled portal for Japanese folk, electronic and conceptual music.  Under the guidance of Yuhi Nakano, Improvica serves indie to major labels from Europe and Japan, as well as organising events, concerts and art exhibitions.”

Clearly the East End of London is the place to fix your sites if you’re interested in Japan, because barely 3 days later you’ve got the Takahiko Iimura screenings coming to Bethnal Green, as I just posted last time, and there’s Zipangu Fest coming up at the end of November – watch this space for more info.

Visions of the Osakan underground music scene in Butt Boat

As for Butt Boat, it looks like its going to be a good fun night and I’ll be there in my element. I was passed on the information by the producer of Go Shibata, the director of such dirt-under-the-fingernail hits as NN-891102, Late Bloomer and Doman Seman, one of the many figures who have added their seal of approval to the film. All I know is there’s a lot of Osaka’s thriving music scene in the film, and a lot of bare arses too. Read on for the official blurb, and if that’s not enough for you, check out the official website here…

SHIRIFUNE ‘BUTT BOAT’ (film screening)
SOBAMESHI & PORNO (live)
BO NINGEN (dj set)
+ Authentic Osaka Okonomiyaki on sale!

With his previous film “Rainmaker”, director Moriro Miyamoto became the focus of much attention due to his aesthetic sensitivity said to be that of a filmmaker 20 years his senior.
In stark contrast to “Rainmaker”, which was shot in Berlin, Glasgow, Vietnam, the Tottori sand dunes and Osaka, new production “Butt Boat” was filmed entirely within the city of Osaka.
His inspiration: ‘butt paintings’.
Taking this obscure underground phenomenon as his topic, Miyamoto put onto film a noisy syntax of scenes saturated with the indigenous beat of Osaka.
Featuring not only members of the Osaka music scene, but also distinguished collaborators from various fields both in front of and behind the camera, “Butt Boat” boisterously shines with the young talent of the Kansai region.
In particular, members of the band OSHIRI PENPENZ were a cornerstone of the production, contributing music and sound recording as well as appearing in the film.
Positive responses to “Butt Boat” have come from several leading filmmakers, artists and musicians including JOJO Hiroshige, Shinji Imaoka, Mitsuru Meike, Shinsuke Michishita, Go Shibata, Tetsuya Umeda, Taichi Oka , Tetsujin Yajirushi and Hitoshi Odajima.

“Butt Boat”
The right eye spells your fortune, the left eye filled with light,
Standing tall with a backbone of chaos, this is Palace Noir!!

2009 / Japan / 82mins / DV / Color

Kakera UK release poster

I had a lot of fun this Saturday, with the UK launch of Momoko Ando’s Kakera taking place at London’s Institute of Contemporary Arts and distributor Adam Torel of Third Window Films laying on a really great shindig after the screening. This wasn’t the official UK premiere, as the film was the centrepiece of my Japanese Women Filmmakers special programme at Raindance last year, which was in actual fact the world premiere. Instead, this event was billed as the Special Gala Opening, before it begins a longer run at the ICA from April 2^nd and goes on to play selected venues across the country, and I’m delighted to say that, as with the Raindance showings, it was really well attended and it was great to see Momoko back in the country again.

Tasuku Nagaoka and Hikari Mitsushima in a scene from Kakera.

Unusually, the film is being released more or less simultaneously in London and Tokyo, so Momoko has already jetted back for the Japanese opening. Anyway, I was present at the ICA to conduct an interview for the forthcoming DVD release and to moderate the Q&A after the screening, which I thought went great; there were a lot of interesting, intelligent questions from a lively audience (especially from members of the Coventry East Asian Film Society, who were there en masse),  and the director gave us some fascinating insights into some of the personal experiences that worked their way into the film. All in all, a big success, and a great time was had by all.

There’s going to be an interview with Momoko and a review of the film popping up on Midnight Eye any day now to tie in with the UK theatrical run, and it will also be playing at Nippon Connection in Frankfurt mid-April (and presumably other festivals after that), but if its not coming to a cinema near you, then the DVD is already up for pre-order on Amazon, and is released on June 21st.

Momoko Ando and the controversial Japanese ad campaign for Kakera, taken in Tokyo.

Third Window has also announced it has acquired Yoshihiro Nakamura’s Fish Story for the UK, which was in many of the other Midnight Eye critics Top Tens from last year. I have to confess I still haven’t seen it, but along with the rest of all us London-dwellers, I’ll get a chance in May at the Terracotta Far East Film Festival held at the Prince Charles Cinema, Leicester Square, along with a whole host of other top titles from 2009, including Mamoru Hosoda’s acclaimed anime Summer Wars. Oh yes, these are good times for Asian film fans in the UK…

While it was great to see Momoko back in London again, I should add that it was only a couple of weeks ago that I last saw her in Tokyo, along with all the other guests that came to Raindance, firstly at another great bash in Tokyo kindly organised by Yoshihiro Ito, director of the sublime shorts package Vortex and Others, then secondly at a post-screening screening panel discussion for Yasunobu Takahashi’s Locked Out, which after touring various international festivals last year had just been released at the new Roppongi Cinemart, on a double bill with another great indie title that has screened quite extensively worldwide, Nobuyuki Miyake’s Lost & Found.

Yasunobu Takahashi's Locked Out

A quick bit about the Cinemart. There’s been a lot of negative murmurings over the past year or so about the current state of the Japanese film industry, namely the dominance by the major studios, in particular Toho, and the prevalence of tried and tested formulas such as TV and manga adaptations, idol vehicles and the like, but this new venue is quite a find, and apparently part of a minor chain with others venues in Shinjuku and Shinsaibashi too. Stuck in the heart of Tokyo’s gaijin stronghold of Roppongi, it boasts several screens (I think there were three but I can’t remember exactly) pretty much dedicated to screening lower-budget or independently-produced films, mainly Japanese made, but also from other Asian countries, most notably South Korea, as well as other international art films. I’m trying to imagine how a similar enterprise in London might fare, devoted to British and Irish works, but somehow I can’t imagine it being as well-attended as it was for the late screening I caught of Locked Out. This is what I love about the Japanese industry; just when you think its dying out or has reached a lull, there’s some new development that emerges that completely catches you off-guard. One of the main problems that Japanese filmmakers have faced over the last five years or so is the bottleneck in getting their films actually out there to the general public. There was no shortage of interesting work being made, just a shortage of screens on which to get them out there. And I’m also heartened by the fact that there’s clearly a local audience out there for it too.

Nobuyuki Miyake's Lost & Found

The other thing that really hit me this trip out to Japan was the vast leap in the quality of recent indie jishu eiga releases. There’s barely any of the self-indulgent approach to storytelling and amateurish shaky handicam stylistics that dominated much of the sector’s output a few years ago. Both Locked Out and Lost & Found are really slickly made, well acted, well lit, and beautifully shot using HD cameras, and they both tell solid stories in a nicely-paced, self-contained format. In a nutshell, they are both really professional pieces and their directors are certain to go along way in the industry. After also recently catching Yosuke Okuda’s polished and energizing youth-on-the-rampage movie Hot as Hell, which won the Grand Prix in the Off Theatre section of Yubari and Tetsuichiro Tsuta’s retro-looking environmental thriller Island of Dreams, which scooped up a number of awards at last year’s PIA Film Festival, it is clear to me that there are some great new directors emerging and Japanese cinema is once more in the midst of a quiet but highly significant indie revolution, and its going to be fascinating to see where it’s all going to take us.

Locked Out director Yasunobu Takahashi flanked by Tokachi Tsuchiya and Momoko Ando during panel at Roppongi Cinemart on 9th March 2010.

Anyway, the Locked Out panel discussion made for a lovely penultimate night during my Japan trip, as it took place between Yasunobu Takahashi, A Normal Life Please director Tokachi Tsuchiya and Momoko Ando, all three friendly faces from their trip to London last October for Raindance – there was much natsukashii sentiment in the air as Takahashi-san presented a 10-minute video diary he had shot during Raindance, which was quite a shock as I hadn’t exactly anticipated seeing my face projected large onto the screen, and was content to sit discreetly hidden in corner, before being invited out front to say a few words on the state of recent indie productions in Japan. A great coda to my stay, and I wish all three a great future in the industry – they’ve certainly all got the talent for it!

With Locked Out director Yasunobu Takahashi and lead actor Kiichi Sonobe

]]> http://jaspersharp.com/blog/news/2010/03/banzai-kantoku-tachi/feed/ 2 http://jaspersharp.com/blog/news/2009/12/kakera-%e2%80%93-a-piece-of-our-life-up-for-uk-theatrical-release-in-april/ http://jaspersharp.com/blog/news/2009/12/kakera-%e2%80%93-a-piece-of-our-life-up-for-uk-theatrical-release-in-april/#comments Mon, 21 Dec 2009 14:36:21 +0000 Jasper http://jaspersharp.com/blog/?p=228

Hikari Mitushima in Momoko Ando's Kakera - A Piece of Our Life

Some rather joyous festive season news courtesy of Third Window Films. The company has just announced that is has acquired UK theatrical and DVD rights for Momoko Ando’s touching debut, Kakera – A Piece of Our Life. As has been mentioned on these pages several times, the film played to great aplomb at this year’s Raindance Film Festival back in November, with Momoko in attendance for two sold-out screenings along with former Smashing Pumpkins guitarist James Iha, who contributed the film’s score. It was greeted with a similarly enthusiastic reception at Stockholm Film Festival and Kinotayo in Paris, where Momoko was awarded the ‘Prix Nikon de la Plus Belle Image.’ The film opens in London on April 2^nd 2010, coinciding with the Japanese release, although there will be a premiere in London the week before this, which I’m rather hoping that Momoko Ando will be over for.

This is probably as good a time as any to correct a piece of misinformation that somehow crept on to the Raindance website and has found itself replicated on the Internet Movie Database, but Kakera was directed and WRITTEN by Momoko Ando – the credit for Yuko Shiomaki is incorrect, so I hope this gets changed on the IMDB sometime soon. Momoko  is the daughter of the famous actor-director Eiji Okuda, and sister of Sakura Ando, one of the most exciting new actresses to emerge from Japan in recent years. Sakura can be seen in Yuki Tanada’s Ain’t No Tomorrows, but also in Love Exposure, which Third Window put out theatrically a month or so ago to an overwhelmingly positive critical response. Love Exposure and Kakera also share the same actress, Hikari Mitsushima.

Still on the subject of Love Exposure, other news from Third Window is that this films DVD release has been put back a fortnight to January 25^th, although it is still up for Amazon pre-order.

]]> http://jaspersharp.com/blog/news/2009/12/kakera-%e2%80%93-a-piece-of-our-life-up-for-uk-theatrical-release-in-april/feed/ 0 http://jaspersharp.com/blog/news/2009/10/shion-sonos-love-exposure-released-in-london-from-this-friday/ http://jaspersharp.com/blog/news/2009/10/shion-sonos-love-exposure-released-in-london-from-this-friday/#comments Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:25:31 +0000 Jasper http://jaspersharp.com/blog/?p=140

Hikari Mitsushima in Sion Sono's Love Exposure

It’s done great guns on the festival circuit and now, courtesy of Third Window Films, Love Exposure is just about to get its official UK release with a month-long run at the ICA in London this November, with a screening on November 14^th at Leeds International Film Festival and no doubt other dates in the UK to follow. It’s surely a bold move on the behalf of both Third Window Films and the ICA, but (and I’m getting almost tired of saying this), DO NOT BE PUT OFF BY THE 4-HOUR RUNNING TIME! This is the strongest film from Japan I’ve seen in a long-time. Read any review you can find online about it, ask anyone who has seen it. They’ll all tell you the same thing – it’s an absolutely fantastic experience, so intense you’ll be still struggling to assimilate it all for days, nay weeks, after you’ve seen it. The film whips along at such a cracking pace that you’re barely registering the time, and when the interval occurs, it seems like a major inconvenience.

Takahiro Nishijima, the star of Love Exposure

I’ve experienced the film twice already, firstly on DVD while looking for suitable titles for this year’s Raindance, and secondly at Raindance itself. The first time I thought it would take a couple of sittings to get through, but it didn’t take too long for me to realise I was in for the long haul. The second time, at the festival itself, was my first chance seeing it on a big screen, and I was so immersed in it that even then I knew I simply had to see it again, so I’ll most certainly be trotting off to the ICA at some juncture. And this seems to be the typical response. Several at the Japanese guests at Raindance had already seen the film several times. One chalked up their sixth viewing at the festival – that’s a full day in total of Sion Sono’s masterpiece! Another reported their experience of seeing the film in Tokyo, in which during the interval the other viewers could be seen wandering around with ecstatic expressions on their faces, and I couldn’t but help notice a similar phenomenon at Raindance. Ooh, I’m getting goose-pimples just thinking about it. My only regret is that the film was originally meant to be six hours, and Sono had to cut it down by a quarter at the insistence of his producer. I can only pray that at some point we’ll ever get a chance to see the full cut.

Sakura Ando and friends

Not sure what else I can say to anyone but to implore you to go see it. If you’ve seen it once, then see it again, tell your friends what a masterpiece it is. And if you have no idea of what I am talking about, then here’s a quick taster in the form of the trailer.

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