Hiroyuki Ono

Uzumasa Limelight

Fewer samurai films are being made, and the Uzumasa studio has fallen on hard times. One day, veteran "kirareyaku" (whose job it is to be felled with a sword by a film's star) actor Kamiyama is tasked with teaching sword action techniques to fledgling actress Satsuki. A few years later, the now-retired Kamiyama is visited by Satsuki, who has become a popular star.

福本清三 どこかで誰かが見ていてくれる

For 60 years, he toiled in obscurity, devoting himself entirely to the role of the ‘execution victim’ in the shadow of the stars. A treasure of the period drama genre, he was cast in the Hollywood film *The Last Samurai* and even starred in his own film. A documentary depicting the extraordinary life of Japan’s foremost ‘execution victim’ has now been released.

Musicophilia

Based on webcomic “Musicophilia” by Akira Saso published in 2011, this is a film about Saku Urushibara, a young man with a special ability to understand sounds in nature. His father is a prominent composer, and his younger half-brother is a genius music composer. Due to the success achieved by his father and half-brother, Saku Urushibara has an inferiority complex. He tries to stay away from music because of this, but he ends up enrolling at the University of Arts in Kyoto where his special ability helps him find his own voice in the world of contemporary classical music.

The Master of Funerals

Alumni of Ibaraki High School learn that one of their classmates is killed in an accident on the tenth anniversary of their graduation, necessitating an unexpected reunion and “on-campus funeral”. They spend a strange night together, during which the secrets of his life are revealed and they rededicate themselves to his memory, with a new outlook on life.