Nobuhiro Kawanaka

A nostalgic work, which attempts to reconstruct the materials of postwar 35 mm newsreel footage given by the filmmakers’ friend and old tinted picture postcards. He frankly describes in his own coherent style of filmmaking how he was moved when he saw these films and photographs for the first time. An attempt to rediscover fresh and new images in the past products.

A five-part documentary chronicling Toshio Matsumoto, the legendary filmmaker known as a pioneer of experimental cinema in Japan and also active as a film theorist, who exerted a profound influence on innovative film expression from the 1950s onward. Directed by filmmaker and critic Takefumi Tsutsui—himself both a filmmaker and critic like Matsumoto—the project was filmed over the course of ten years. Interweaving excerpts from Matsumoto’s works with an extensive series of interviews with collaborators and critics, the documentary retraces, through the figure of Matsumoto, the tumultuous decades from the 1950s to the 2000s across five parts, totaling 700 minutes.

Photographs of a nude, arranged into stop-motion sequences on the left half of the screen, are juxtaposed with a close-up of the film itself passing in front of a viewer, gradually revealed on the right half of the screen.

Video began as a medium that inspired discovery. This art documentary traces the expressive roots of “media art” in Japan — works of video, performances, and installations created using video technology that allowed for free and creative visual expression.

Masato Hara made his directorial debut in high school in 1968 and achieved a reputation as a young prodigy. Many years later, he continues to make films and show his old experimental 'live-screening' films, but is saddled with massive debts. This film follows eight years in his life.

Video short by Japanese filmmaker Nobuhiro Kawanaka, premiered at the Image Forum Festival in 2012.

Lately, I cannot help thinking; “What if the gods created life and death by mistake?” I find it odd that as I age, my body withers. If, as I slip into old age, my heart becomes young, then it would be appropriate if my body could follow suit. Wouldn’t it be nice if humans were born elderly, and in reverse, died of old age in an infant’s body?. (Hagiwara Sakumi)

Since she was a little girl, Nagisa Yoko had two dreams: one was to have a song written for her by Aku Yu; the other was to sing at the Shinjuku Koma Theater. Aku Yu had already had written an original song for her. When Nagisa heard that the Shinjuku Koma Theater was to close down, she decided that she would have to rent the hall herself, in order to realize her dream. The concert was a great success, aided by many of her friends, including Wakamatsu Koji, Yamaya Hatsuo, Naito Chin, and Mikami Kan, who grew up in Shinjuku. Director Kawanaka Nobuhiro has fond memories from decades ago, when he was delivering milk and had a chance to talk with the Shinkokugeki actor Ogata Ken in the Shinjuku Koma Theater dressing room. He returns to that room in this film.