薩チャン 正ちゃん　～戦後民主的独立プロ奮闘記～

After the war, many filmmakers were expelled from the Japanese film industry due to the Toho Dispute and the Red Purge. Amid such circumstances, there were people who set up their own independent production companies and embarked on film production without relying on corporations. This documentary film focuses on the passionate "spirit of film" of directors such as Satsuo Yamamoto and Tadashi Imai, who, despite many hardships, produced a succession of masterpieces overflowing with humanism and rebellious spirit.

The Erotic Empire

A short documentary primarily focused on Nikkatsu's Roman Porno series.

石井輝男 FAN CLUB

A documentary on Teruo Ishii, the Japanese "King of Cult".

A. K.

An intimate chronicle of the shooting of Ran (1985), a film directed by the legendary Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa.

Seijun Suzuki: kabuki & yakuzas

Film director and screenwriter Seijun Suzuki (1923-2017), who in the sixties was the great innovator of Japanese cinema; and his collaborator, art director and screenwriter Takeo Kimura (1918-2010), recall how they made their great masterpieces about the Yakuza underworld for the Nikkatsu film company.

Bâtons d'encens pour Mizoguchi

健さん

KEN SAN pieces together the puzzle of the life and legacy of Japan's mythical acting icon, Ken Takakura. Collaborators, friends and family tell intimate stories of Ken's journey: how one man of quiet dignity became a cultural barrier-breaking film star.

“樹木希林”を生きる

This documentary follows the last days of actress KIKI Kirin, who passed away on September 15, 2018. The documentary is the first long-term, in-depth coverage of Ki-kin, and is a re-edited version of the NHK documentary of the same title that was broadcast on September 26, 2006, adding previously unseen footage. She was loved all over Japan for her blunt remarks, her attentive concern for those around her, and her overflowing sense of humor. Despite her busy schedule, she valued her daily life and had her own unique style, even though she talked about life as it came. This film captures the last days of her life and gives us hints for living from her "life as it comes" and her many inspiring words.

三文役者

The film is a series of vignettes from Taiji Tonoyama's life and film clips, interspersed with a dialogue to camera by Nobuko Otowa, addressing the camera as if she is addressing Tonoyama himself, recollecting events in his life. The film focuses on Tonoyama's alcohol dependence and his various sexual relationships, as well as his film work with Shindo.

山中貞雄に捧げる漫画映画『鼠小僧次郎吉』

Legendary anime director Rintaro’s (Metropolis, X/1999, Galaxy Express 999) first new work in over a decade depicts pioneering 1930s director Sadao Yamanaka and the production of his Nezumikozo Jirokichi. Despite dying before the age of 30, Yamanaka was a pivotal influence in Japanese cinema whose work would go on to inspire future generations. While most of his films have been lost to time, his scripts remain, and Nezumikozo Jirokichi recreates one of these lost films—a tale of a famous, virtuous bandit in old Edo—as imagined by Rintaro together with an all-star team including Katsuhiro Otomo (Akira, Memories), Taro Maki (Pluto, Millennium Actress) and Masao Maruyama (Ninja Scroll, Perfect Blue).

赤い陰影

Keichi Tanaamis new animation work Red Shade (2021) is based on paintings that he had produced on the premise that they will be set in motion. Each of the 80 selected scenes was given a distinct movement of its own, and the edited version of the completed work became the first film. The 80 scenes are each independently complete, and can be freely rearranged. For example, you can start from scent 80 and end in scene one, or arrange them irregularly like 1, 4, 8, 7, and so on. In other words, the essence of the work does not change no matter how the scenes are arranged. Even so, it is possible to produce a strong impact by exchanging the images for each frame, and one can also for instance, create an impression of a refreshing breeze sweeping through the green meadows.

Tertiary Sound

ASMR: A feeling that disappears because it’s too subtle to notice, leaving a trace of a soft tingling sensation behind.

How to Breathe in Kern County

As the day grinds to a halt, agricultural workers gather to street race in the quiet, contemplative night.

Locked Off

Rave Culture is one of Britain’s great cultural exports, but after its first wave in the late eighties and early nineties, it was soon forced into the underground by stringent new laws and superclubs. But forward 25 years into in the midst of a nationwide purge on the nation’s nightlife, where nearly half of all British clubs have shut down in the last decade, and a new kind of scene has emerged. Clive Martin investigates this 21st century version of Rave, where young people break into disused spaces with the help of bolt-cutters and complicated squatting laws, to suck on balloons and go hard into the early morning. But with the police using increasingly extreme tactics to clamp down on these parties, and more than one fatality causing nationwide media panic, can the scene survive?

Here at the Water's Edge

Leo Hurwitz’s film, Here At The Water’s Edge, features the 1960 New York City’s waterfront. Made with photographer Charles Pratt, the film is a cinematic poem to the people who work on the water. Pratt, who largely financed the film, made it possible for Leo to use his vision as an artist and filmmaker while the blacklist still over-shadowed his life and ability to work in other areas. Here At The Water’s Edge, a film without narration, draws our attention to the often-neglected life in, on and around water – as well as bringing into view what workers on the water give us. Leo, in his own work, was always concerned with seeing what is happening in spaces in the world where others fail to look.

Chahine & Co

A “Cinéma, de notre temps” series episode directed by French film critic Jean-Louis Comolli on the Egyptian director Youssef Chahine.

Citizen Ken Loach

A “Cinéma, de notre temps” series episode directed by french filmmaker Karim Dridi, originally aired 2 July 1997.

Le Home Cinéma des frères Dardenne

A “Cinéma, de notre temps” series episode directed by french film filmmaker Jean-Pierre Limosin, originally aired sometime around 2006.

Le Cinéma de grand-père

Remarkable life story of Henri Diamant-Berger, a director and screenwriter whose devotion to cinema led him to collaborate with some of the greatest actors and filmmakers of his time.

Nanook of the North

This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.