Black Ox

As a tunnel construction project threatens the natural order of one of Japan's last untouched regions, an old man and his granddaughter Haruna's humble lifestyle begins to influence the outlook of a man from Tokyo.

In a near-future Japanese city bracing for a devastating earthquake, a group of teenage friends navigate personal struggles and fractured bonds amid rising tension.

A case-hardened cop is pitted against a young eco-terrorist. The title "island" is an artificial construct in Tokyo Bay, a mountain of garbage, a by-product of Japan’s economic boom years. The film’s protagonist Alan works there, almost buried under society’s detritus; his growing obsession with the search for “what has been lost” turns him into a "dangerous" activist. He targets the industrialist Wada, whose chemical factory secretly discharges toxic waste into the environment. But the cop Terayama, who thought he’d seen it all, starts researching eco-activism and soon suspects the haunted, taciturn young man he’s encountered in the neighborhood.

Director Tsuta has produced this docudrama in promotion of the local forestry industry. Despite its matter-of-fact narration and simple subject matter, the film surprises us with its profound message behind and its mythical touch in the end as inspired by Japanese folklores.

Three short stories, all about bicycles and/or bicycle racing. Specifically, keirin track bicycle racing. An aging cyclist is too young to quit racing, but too old to keep up. A friendship between two old friends would fall apart, if it wasn’t for the keirin race. In between, a magical realist fable about the bond between a woman and her bike.

Somewhere in Japan, two men live in a new age house, through the windows of which the reflections and ripples of the rain shimmer in black and white. One of them explains to a journalist that the house’s design allows them to gather rainwater and use it for the plants that they grow in order to meet their needs. The other brings them tea. One is granted speech and social consideration, the other labour. But when they leave the house to walk through the fields or go fishing for eels, or when they try to kill a tortoise for a meal, the positions are reversed. An unexpected cruelty suddenly spices up this slapstick variation on diverging relations to nature in contemporary Japan. (Nathan Letoré)