Festival Report: Nippon Connection 2012

by Marc Saint-Cyr

Those initially scanning the program for the 12th Nippon Connection film festival, hosted in Frankfurt, Germany from May 2nd to the 6th, probably would have noticed the especially impressive selection of new works from some of Japanese cinema’s biggest names. This year, established auteurs were a more frequent sight alongside lesser-known and still-emerging directors, whose efforts – from my personal festival experience, at least – for the most part offered healthy competition against their better-known colleagues. In fact, I ended up being quite pleasantly surprised by how many positive viewing experiences I managed to discover in both the Nippon Cinema and Nippon Visions programs, the latter focusing on independent and digitally shot productions.

Postcard

The festival’s opening night film was “Postcard,” the 49th and intended final film by Kaneto Shindo, who celebrated his 100th birthday on April 22nd. As Eric Evans ably illustrates in his full review, this is a markedly odd film that erratically dips and spikes in its emotional atmosphere. Shinobu Otake stars as Tomoko, a woman who experiences a spectacular avalanche of misfortune brought about by World War II. Bound to her in-laws’ isolated farm, she encounters Keita (Etsushi Toyokawa), a veteran who arrives to fulfill his promise to deliver a cherished article – the titular postcard – previously owned by her deceased husband, Jouzukuri (Naomasa Musaka). Otake’s performance is especially remarkable as she channels quiet resolve, solemn despair and raw, unbridled agony, yet she is but one element in a piece that seems intent on packing in a full spectrum of moods and spectacles rather than constructing a more even narrative arc. Thus, we get nearly implausible depths of hardship, the absurdities of wartime fervor, the refreshingly lighthearted exchanges between Keita and his uncle, a comically persistent suitor (Ren Osugi), the rough fight between him and Keita, a celebratory play and hopeful signs of fresh beginnings. While that last ingredient, encapsulated in the idyllic final scene, is somewhat at odds with the actual climate of post-WWII Japan, it still seems fitting for both the characters and Shindo himself, who, after all, by now knows a thing or two about marching onwards and finding fulfillment through productivity.

Casting Blossoms to the Sky

While not quite yet at Shindo’s centennial level, Nobuhiko Obayashi, now 74, still remains impressively productive for his advanced age and, more importantly, is capable of proving he is still as full of surprises as he was when he made his now-beloved 1977 cult classic, “House.” His latest effort, “Casting Blossoms to the Sky,” is surely unlike anything else that will be screened this year. Over the course of its breathless 160 minutes, it uses a reporter’s desire to visit and investigate Nagaoka as a framework for its nearly essay-like exploration of the city’s links to the events of WWII and personal accounts of those who survived the destructive events of the past (with some of the real-life inspirations behind certain characters actually making onscreen appearances). Jumping from speaker to speaker at hot potato speeds and virtually pelting the viewers with facts and stories, Obayashi weaves together the hidden details of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing operations, incendiary bombing incidents, Pearl Harbor, 3-11, the art of firework creation, a young student’s ambitious theatrical production and more into an exhilarating and touching cinematic symphony. Its ardent plea for humanity to work towards a more hopeful future by learning from history might have come across as being exhaustively preachy had it not been presented in such a wholly sincere and original fashion, all the while accompanied by a rich Joe Hisaishi score. And the daring, dreamlike quality of the imagery only sweetens the deal, often reaching pulse-quickening heights – who could ever forget the sight of a group of uniformed students perched upright on their unicycles coasting across the frame in single-file along a country road? Like many other shots, so odd, but so beautiful.

Kotoko

Shinya Tsukamoto was present at the festival with his first film after a string of more mainstream studio projects: “Kotoko,” which was given the Orizzonti Award at the Venice International Film Festival last year. This up-close character study of singer Cocco’s titular single mother as she struggles with mental illness is an unquestionably powerful piece of cinema. Entering it, viewers have little choice but to be confronted with her claustrophobic head space, which plagues her with hallucinations of menacing doppelgangers, bursts of brutal violence and a devouring sense of dread. Brilliantly orchestrating camerawork, sound design and surrealist storytelling strategies, Tsukamoto has produced an utterly terrifying viewing experience that may very well come to be regarded as one of his finest accomplishments.

Sukiyaki

Fortunately, there were other films that proved to be more gentle with audiences’ nerves, two of them being Tetsu Maeda’s “Sukiyaki” and Shûichi Okita’s “The Woodsman and the Rain,” which ended up winning the audience-voted Nippon Cinema Award. The latter follows Kôji Yakusho’s lumberjack as he gets pulled into a zombie film shoot led by an insecure 25 year-old writer-director (Shun Oguri) while the former, with its “One Thousand and One Nights”-style narrative concerning prison cellmates who share personal stories about their most cherished meals in a contest for extra morsels, proves itself to be a worthy thematic counterpart to such films as “Tampopo” and “Still Walking” with its own extended, sumptuously photographed send-ups to the special links food shares with memory and love. Certainly, like those films, “Sukiyaki” is bound to leave viewers with a deeper appreciation for at least the next few dishes they enjoy after the credits roll.

Ten Days Before Spring
          

Over a year has passed since the earthquake, tsunami and ignition of Fukushima's nuclear troubles that occurred on March 11th, 2011, and in that time film festivals have received numerous cinematic responses to the monumental events that left a still-reverberating impact on Japan. Nippon Connection presented a varied selection of mostly non-fiction films addressing the disasters, some of which earning official recognition: Masaki Kobayashi’s “Fukushima Hula Girls” came in third place in the audience vote for the Nippon Cinema Award (Tatsushi Omori’s “Tada’s Do-It-All House” earned the second place spot). Additionally, the jury for the Nippon Visions Award (consisting of journalist Andreas Platthaus, filmmaker Yonghi Yang and the Pow-Wow’s own Chris MaGee) gave a Special Mention to Yojyu Matsubayashi’s documentary “Fukushima: Memories of a Lost Landscape” while bestowing the main award to Juichiro Yamasaki’s feature debut, “The Sound of Light.” My personal reflection on 3-11 during the festival occurred via a short and feature pairing that began with “Ten Days Before Spring,” written and directed by Dutch filmmaker Stefanie Kolk. Following a Japanese woman living and working in Amsterdam (Misaki Yamada) who desperately tries to make contact with her mother shortly after the tsunami hits, the fictional film perfectly captures the utter helplessness and agonizing worry that so many like the heroine must have experienced while waiting to hear from their loved ones in Japan. She has no choice but to go through the motions of her daily routine while ominous signs like the unanswered phone calls and a package from Japan sent prior to the disaster emphasize the inescapable, terrible sense of ambiguity. Not wasting any of its 13 minutes, the film wisely utilizes a lean, observational style to depict with commendable clarity the main character’s emotional state. Jumping from that distant vantage point straight into directly affected zones on the Japanese coast shortly after the tsunami, Koichi Omiya’s “The Sketch of Mujo” maintains a very specific approach to make its own impression on viewers. No music, no voiceovers, no direct allusions to the filmmakers’ presence behind the camera – just occasional interviews with survivors and shot after lingering shot of the immeasurable quantities of debris, ruins and scattered belongings left in the wake of the waves.

 The Egoists

           

Arriving late in the festival lineup, Ryuichi Hiroki’s “The Egoists” supplied an electrifying jolt of sexiness and tragic recklessness to its lucky audience. Small-time thug Kazu (Kengo Kora) and topless dancer Machiko (Anne Suzuki) decide to ditch Tokyo and start a new life together, but disagreements with his father, difficult patches in the relationship and, most seriously, a towering debt to some particularly nasty yakuza soon begin to press heavily upon their initial dreams of bliss and escape. Strongly evoking Jean-Luc Godard’s classic tales of doomed love – think “Breathless” or “Pierrot le fou” – “The Egoists” captivates with its ode to the glorious highs and cruel lows of passionate, destructive youth. Another film that very nearly managed to be just as compelling was Nobuhiro Yamashita’s “My Back Page,” which portrays a young reporter’s immersion in the revolutionary activities of 1970s Japan and bond with an alleged member of a radical group. The storytelling and character development is multi-layered and engaging, though some may leave the film craving a deeper immersion in the nitty-gritty of investigative research (as in David Fincher’s “Zodiac”) or the narrative trajectories and details of history (as in Olivier Assayas’ “Carlos”). Fortunately, festival-goers had opportunities to further educate themselves in this tumultuous era of Japan’s political history through the efforts of Vertigo Magazine commissioning editor and film curator Julian Ross, who delivered a talk entitled “Images of Protest, Images as Protest: Japanese Cinema and Political Activism,” which covered the early May Day protests of the 1920s and ‘30s; such filmmakers as Shinsuke Ogawa, Motoharu Jonouchi and Masao Adachi; and the more recent protest activities in the wake of 3-11, among many other subjects. The festival also featured a series of Japanese protest film screenings including works by Ogawa and Jonouchi at Frankfurt’s Deutsches Filmmuseum.

The Great Rabbit 

Another guest present throughout the festival was Dr. Catherine Munroe Hotes of the Nishikata Film Review blog, who was involved in multiple events representing another facet of Japanese cinema: animation. A specialist in the field, Dr. Hotes assembled the animated shorts program entitled “Spaces In-Between: Indie Animated Shorts from Japan,” which included works by Tomoyasu Murata (“Lemon’s Road”), Akino Kondo (“Kiya Kiya”), Koji Yamamura (“Muybridge’s Strings”), Ryo Hirano (“Holiday”), Mirai Mizue (“Modern,” “Modern No. 2”) and Atsushi Wada (“In a Pig’s Eye,” “The Great Rabbit”). Dr. Hotes also delivered a talk on puppet master Kihachiro Kawamoto, whom she has written about for the “Directory of World Cinema: Japan 2,” and conducted an onstage interview with Wada about his work.

Our Homeland

Easily the most moving film I encountered this year at Nippon Connection was, fittingly, the very last one I saw, sneakily lying in wait in the lineup to trump the previous offerings (despite their respective strengths) with its calm, controlled power. Two years previous, I was greatly impressed by Korean-Japanese filmmaker Yonghi Yang’s documentary “Sona, the Other Myself” when it was screened at the festival; now, making her transition into feature filmmaking with “Our Homeland,” she continues to explore the troubling effects of North Korea’s controlling regime and, more specifically, how it has divided her family by preventing her from maintaining regular contact with her three brothers since they moved back to the isolated nation in the 1970s. Based on Yang’s personal experiences, her new film stars Arata Iura (better known simply as Arata) as Songho, a Japanese man who has lived in North Korea for 25 years away from the rest of his family. Permitted a three-month visit to Japan to treat a brain tumor (an opportunity that took five years to secure), he is reunited with his family and friends, among them his gruff father (Masane Tsukayama), who still remains firmly devoted to North Korea’s ideology, and his caring sister Rie (Sakura Ando), who is unafraid to voice her disgust at the absurd conditions that define Songho’s situation. A painful sense of restriction and temporality permeates every second of Songho’s visit, underlined by the physical presence of his stoic North Korean escort Mr. Yang (Yang Ik-Joon, the writer and director of 2008’s “Breathless”). Iura’s performance does so much to reflect the traumas suffered by his character – his cautious reservation, nervous smiles and extreme shyness are all the signs of a man who has spent most of his life afraid of testing the dangerous authority he lives under, and who can still feel its hold on him during this all-too-brief reprieve. Besides being a perfectly rendered consideration of a political subject through an intensely personal story, “Our Homeland” reveals with incredible insight just how much many might take for granted because they are closer to Rie’s situation than Songho’s, and thus able to enjoy the closeness of family, freedom of expression and privileges of a liberal society without fear of dire and immediate repercussions. We need a film like this every now and then (and maybe a little more often than that) to be reminded of both our own good fortunes and the grotesque injustices that still persist in certain parts of the world. After the diverse array of delights, shocks and food for thought that my selection of films left me with throughout the week, it seemed proper to finally conclude the festival (and, ironically, begin my journey home to my own family) on a note of grateful contemplation.

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Throughout the festival, attendees could watch artist Kozue Kodama as she "live-painted" a new picture from scratch

Catherine Munroe Hotes during her talk with animator Atsushi Wada



Group picture of assembled guests and staff

Nippon Visions jurors Andreas Platthaus, Chris MaGee and Yonghi Yang during the awards announcements

Yonghi Yang introducing her film "Our Homeland" with festival director Marion Klomfass


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Personal Top Ten:

1) Our Homeland (Yonghi Yang)

2) Kotoko (Shinya Tsukamoto)

3) Casting Blossoms to the Sky (Nobuhiko Obayashi)

4) The Egoists (Ryuichi Hiroki)

4.5) Ten Days Before Spring (Stefanie Kolk)

5) Sukiyaki (Tetsu Maeda)

6) The Woodsman and the Rain (Shûichi Okita)

7) The Sound of Light (Juichiro Yamasaki)

8) My Back Page (Nobuhiro Yamashita)

9) Come As You Are (Kôta Yoshida)

10) Postcard (Kaneto Shindo)

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Other films featured throughout Nippon Connection 2012 that have been reviewed on the Pow-Wow:

About the Pink Sky (Keiichi Kobayashi)
Come As You Are (Kôta Yoshida)
Die! Directors, Die! (Makoto Shinozaki)
KanZeOn (Neil Cantwell, Tim Grabham)

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Awards:

Nippon Cinema Award: The Woodsman and the Rain (Shûichi Okita)
2nd Place: Tada's Do-It-All House (Tatsushi Omori)
3rd Place: Fukushima Hula Girls (Masaki Kobayashi)

Nippon Visions Award: The Sound of Light (Juichiro Yamasaki)
Special Mention: Fukushima: Memories of a Lost Landscape (Yojyu Matsubayashi)

VGF Nippon in Motion Award: Koi-Man (Micaela Fonseca)



2nd Place: Bōru (Florian Gautier, Stephan Altenhein)



3rd Place: Chado: The Way of Tea (Andrej Uduc)

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Both Chris and I would once again like to thank all the hard-working organizers, volunteers, technicians and press relations personnel who so warmly welcomed us and the other attendees and made this film festival such a positive and memorable experience.

Nicholas Vroman's Top Five Favorite Films of 2011

Nicholas Vroman, our man in Tokyo, is in the enviable position of getting a look at theatrical releases and festival premieres that us other Pow-Wow contributors only dream of. Here are his top theatrical picks from Japan from 2011.

1. Saya Zamurai (dir. Hitoshi Matsumoto)

If you had any doubt, “Saya Zamurai” puts Hitoshi Matsumoto up there with the great comedic auteurs of all time. We’re talking Keaton, Chaplin, Tati and maybe Jerry Lewis. From his first film, “Dainipponjin” to “Symbol" to this one, he’s deconstructed comedy brilliant, if somewhat intellectually. The laughs were more in the mind than the belly. Here he lays the whole idea of comedy and its commerce bare with his hapless hero’s attempts to save his own life through an increasing spectacle of bad jokes – and brings it all around to a moving denouement. In “Saya Zamurai” Matsumoto digs deep into his finely honed comic mind and finds his heart.

2. I Wish (dir. Hirokazu Koreeda)

Hirokazu Koreeda’s joyful “Kiseki” (I Wish) was the perfect antidote to the downbeat mood that has gripped the nation after the great Touhoku earthquake, tsunami and ongoing nuclear crisis. It’s a family movie, and thus didn’t register so highly on most critics’ radars, but what a family movie it is. Kore-eda’s exploration of dreams and hopes isn’t filled with sugar-coated platitudes. The broken dreams and concessions of adults exist side by side with the impossible (and some possible) dreams of the kids who are the engines that drive the film. Maeda Maeda, the pint-sized manzai team who front the film are a joy to watch as they shake up themselves and those around them to at very least make them (and the viewers) recognize that it’s the doing that’s most important.

3. Household X (dir. Koki Yoshida)

“Household X,” Koki Yoshida’s austere an uncompromising exploration of a disintegrating family seems to tread on old ground, with its images of extreme urban alienation and stripped down drama – if one can call long passages of silence and non-communication “drama.” But looking at the motifs and images that bind the story – and the family – together shows a very assured director working with rigor and not a single unnecessary shot. Yoshida knows how to make the most mundane shot significant. “Tokyo Sonata” covered similar ground, but seems downright melodramatic and clichéd compared to “Household X.”

4. My Back Page (dir. Nobuhiro Yamashita)

Nobuhiro Yamashita brings out the best from stars Kenichi Matsuyama as a psychopathic charismatic radical leader and Satoshi Tsumabuki as a young reporter. The smartly directed duo get the rare opportunity to dig into the crazy times of social and political change with a cinematic chemistry that makes a beautiful emotional sense of the relationship between two complex men. “My Back Page” is a welcome addition to a recent spate of films dealing with the radical turmoil of 30 or so years ago. Coupling a bittersweet nostalgia with an unromantic looks at motivation, actions and consequences, it reveals and revels in an emotional honesty that says more than most history books.

5. Tokyo Drifter (dir. Tetsuaki Matsue)

As in “Live Tape,” Matsue Tetsuaki follows singer Kenta Maeno, this time over one rainy night in Tokyo. Maeno’s love/hate songs to Tokyo work like a concept album. Countered with the ugly, shaky and increasingly degraded look of the visuals (shot by “My Back Page” and “Saya Zamurai” cinematographer, Ryuto Kondo), Tetsuaki perversely explores images, sounds and expectations. As an analog and reference to the handheld ketai images that documented 3.11, the images of “Tokyo Drifter” counterpunch with a celebration of the darkness that engulfed Tokyo for a few months, daring to say, “these are the better times.” Tokyo Drifter’s an audacious and uneven film that brings up a wealth of questions in search of resolutions.

Matthew Hardstaff's Top 5 DVD Releases of 2011

J-Film Pow-Wow contributing writer Matthew Hardstaff had a monumental 2011 with he and his girlfriend welcoming their first child. This might have kept him out of the movie theatre at times, but it didn't keep him away from the video store! Here are Matthew's favorite DVD releases of 2011.

Sleepy Eyes of Death Volume 2 (Animeigo)

The nihilistic badass samurai is back with 4 more films. Nemuri Kyoshiro quickly became one of my favourite samurai characters to grace the silver screen after my first viewing of the original boxed set. However it contained only the first 4 films of the series, and it wasn’t until the fourth film that the true bastard outlaw samurai’s form had truly taken shape. Now, with the next four films in the series, we are treated to the Nemuri Kyoshiro of Renzaburo Shibata’s serialized tales that we only received glimpses of. What these films lack in blood they make up for with perversion and nihilism. Plus, we’re treated to the late great Raizo Ichikawa, his blank, sleepy eyed stare and the hypnotic full moon cut! My favourite purchase of 2011! Now let’s hope they release the last 4 films featuring Ichikawa.

Kuroneko (Criterion)

If we learned anything from Kaneto Shindo’s "Onibaba", the man knows how to weave an engaging and haunting tale filled with feminist undertones, some spectacular black and white imagery, and boiling with an underlying eroticism. "Kuroneko" is no different, and in fact builds on the spectral eeriness and splendid cinematography, creating a brilliant cacophony of the macabre. Witness one of a handful of films that helped to establish what is now the typical genre trappings of J-horror.

Still Walking (Criterion)

During its festival run when I saw this at TIFF, this was one of two films that made me cry (the other being "JCVD"). Hirokazu Kore-eda’s beautiful, poignant tale explores how we inherit the small gestures, the tiny idiosyncrasies, from our parents, despite or in spite of ourselves. It’s touching and moving, and utterly remarkable because it’s able to tell more about human nature than most films with ten times the scale. Or maybe that’s why it works so well? Either way, this is another masterwork from Kore-eda, and my personal favourite of his.

Zebraman 2 (Funimation)

The first installment of "Zebraman" was hilariously entertaining and brilliant in its presentation of the tokusatsu genre. Here Takashi Miike turns the series up to 11, creating an utterly insane and madcap superhero film that takes no prisoners. Miike isn’t known for his subtlety, and this film is no different, but he has a knack for going so far over the top that it winds up in places you couldn’t even imagine. For a guy who became famous for making films that disturbed that hell out of people, he makes incredibly entertaining family films, which is a testament to his ability as a director. This film is a perfect example of his skill.

13 Assassins (Magnolia)

Speaking of Miike and his burgeoning ability to weave films of all genres whilst always turning it up to 11, 13 Assassins was one of my favourite films of 2010, and would be higher on the list if it wasn’t for the fact that this is the international cut of the film, and not the original version. Regardless, this is not your grand daddy’s samurai film. Whereas the original film criticized the feudal society as a whole, here Miike seems content to a more condensed version of the same theme, presenting the world of the samurai as a bloody, filthy, dirty mess, where men, once committed to an ideal, will follow through with it no matter how much it may end up morally opposing them. Men are blinded by their faith, and what follows is a blood bath like no other, where the only person that wins is the one who literally throws dirt in the face of his enemy. He deconstructs the samurai mythos with dirt and blood. And it’s beautiful.

Marc Saint-Cyr's Top Five Favorite Films of 2011

He did a lot of globe trotting with Pow-Wow editor and Chief Chris MaGee during the past 12 months, so here's contributing writer Marc Saint-Cyr's top five theatrical releases of 2011!

1) Abraxas (dir. Naoki Kato)

Out of the many new Japanese films I saw this year, my mind is still littered with startlingly vivid memories of certain passages from Naoki Kato’s "Abraxas." Built around the premise of a Buddhist monk fiercely trying to sustain his passion for performing loud rock music, the film takes great care in the way it develops its characters and involves the audience in their personal struggles, crises and emotions. This is filmmaking with real depth, executed with the perfect degree of sureness and tact. From the wonderful community of characters surrounding Suneohair’s troubled protagonist to the priceless relationships he maintains with his wife and son to specific, unforgettable moments – the monk rocker’s emotional performances among them – there are plenty of rock-solid reasons why, several months after seeing it, "Abraxas" continues to stay with me. I can’t wait to see it again.

2) Midori-ko (dir. Keita Kurosaka)

I had the immense good fortune to see this film twice throughout 2011 – once at the Nippon Connection film festival in Frankfurt, then once more in Toronto in the summer at the Shinsedai Cinema Festival. Both times, I was treated to a one-of-a-kind joy of filmmaking that is all but designed to reveal more with multiple viewings. The entire film was hand-drawn by animator Keita Kurosaka, a task that took him over a decade to accomplish. The world he created is a shadowy, textured dreamscape chock full of bizarre creatures and contraptions, constantly treating viewers to fresh delights and horrors. Expertly deploying absurdist humor, whimsy, melancholy and freakish spectacle, Kurosaka proves himself worthy as not only a great visual artist, but a master storyteller as well.

3) I Wish (dir. Hirokazu Koreeda)

I’ll be honest: when I walked into Hirokazu Kore-eda’s "I Wish," I didn’t really have big expectations. To be more precise, I anticipated Kore-eda Lite: something that would be fairly well made, but mainly concerned with being cheery and amusing. In a sense, that’s what I got – but I also got so much more. With his story of two young brothers kept apart on opposite sides of Japan by their divorced parents, Kore-eda approaches the inner world of children with an inspiring allegiance to nuance and authenticity. He clearly understands the innocence and resilience they wield in both the brighter and darker points in their still-new lives as well as the inner strength that keeps them working towards their deepest wishes. Far from being the simple, family-friendly excursion one might initially anticipate, "I Wish" is good enough to be fairly placed among Kore-eda’s best-loved works – or the best-loved movies about childhood, for that matter.

4) KanZeOn (dir. Neil Cantwell & Tim Grabham)

Like "Midori-ko," "KanZeOn" turned out to be one of the most joyful surprises I discovered on the film festival circuit in 2011. Delving deep into the heart of Japanese culture, Buddhist traditions and musical creation, it is certainly not your typical documentary. Instead, directors Neil Cantwell and Tim Grabham aspire towards an incredibly transcendent cinematic experience, using imagery, music and sound to their fullest capacities in a fluid, shifting structure. The film not only sets out to inform viewers of the bonds between art, nature and spirituality (which it does mainly through interviews with Buddhist priest and DJ Akinobu Tatsumi, sho musician Eri Fujii and Noh master Akihiro Iitomi), but also to inspire an introspective consideration of such elusive subjects on the viewer’s part. In both goals, it succeeds brilliantly.

5) The Catcher on the Shore (dir. Ryugo Nakamura)

Never mind that Ryugo Nakamura, co-writer and director of The Catcher on the Shore (his debut feature), was only fourteen when he made it. Just considered outside of that context, it quite evidently bears a confident and natural filmmaking ability. Portraying a young boy’s visit to his grandparents and estranged father in Okinawa, the film chronicles his progress towards a greater understanding of life, death, nature and man in three distinctive acts. It smoothly shifts between broad comedy, restrained slice-of-life realism and calm contemplation with surprising skill, all of it blending together into a viewing experience far richer than what one might expect from the seemingly slight story material.

Bob Turnbull's Top 5 DVD Releases of 2011

It was a pretty hectic year for a lot of us here at The J-Film Pow-Wow, Bob Turnbull included; but Bob wanted to weigh in on his top DVD releases of the past 12 months. Time to get our your credit cards and go shopping!

1. Cold Fish (Third Window Films)

As great as it was to finally see Sion Sono's "Love Exposure" hit Region 1 this past year, I'd had it in my hands since the early days of 2010 due to a Region 2 release. So my top DVD of the year goes to another Sono film - the daring and fearless "Cold Fish". It was fantastic to see it hit Region 1 during the same calendar year as other regions (J-Film Pow-Wow friends Third Window films released a spiffy 2-disc version this past year as well), but I was just happy it was in circulation - it's not a film that will be embraced by everyone, but I've rarely seen a movie pulse and progress in the way "Cold Fish" did. Just when you think Sono has pushed his story and his presentation to the edge, he pushes even harder and ends up taking you right over that edge. I was happy to make the plunge with him.

2. The Warped World of Koreyoshi Kurahara (Eclipse)

Given the precedents that have been set, I can't imagine a year in the near future when there won't be an Eclipse box set on this list. There's almost no end to the treasures that could be unearthed, but you get the feeling that they are more than happy to keep digging and digging and digging. Previous to this box I was only familiar with Kurahara's entry in a previous Eclipse box - the terrific "I Am Waiting" from the Nikkatsu Noir set. I took a leap of faith that an entire set focused on some of his work from the 1960s would be worth it. I was repaid straight out of the gate with "Intimidation" which was a 65 minute blast of energy and fun wrapped in a solid crime drama. Given the variety of moods and scope within this set, it's easy to see that Kurahara had a restless need to experiment and likely hated to stand still.

3. Branded To Kill / Tokyo Drifter (Criterion Collection)

Two of my favourite films from one of my favourite directors were re-released just before the end of the year in brand spanking new BluRay editions so that each carefully composed frame could be displayed in every shade of grey imaginable ("Branded To Kill") and in every hue your biggest box of crayons might contain ("Tokyo Drifter"). Though Seijun Suzuki has a raft of examples of his ability to take a B-movie script and distill it down to its essence in order to tell the story visually, these two are recognized as the prime pieces of evidence. They're both stylish, fun and bordering on lunacy. If you haven't had the chance to catch up with these classics previously, NOW is the time to do it. I'll wait.

4. Confessions (Third Window Films)

Third Window Films has quickly built up an impressive stable of titles, not the least of which is Tetsuya Nakashima's wonderfully intense "Confessions". The opening 30 minutes is essentially a perfect short film as a school teacher delivers a monologue to her mostly inattentive class detailing the death of her child and the blame she puts on two students. My initial feelings about the film were mixed, but it's grown in estimation since I first saw it at TIFF in 2010. If the rest of the film doesn't quite match that opening, it moves relentlessly towards more and more confessions from its characters and has wound up digging itself into my brain.

5. Still Walking (Criterion Collection)

What a joy it was revisiting this gem from Hirokazu Kore-eda. It wasn't easy picking between this and the gorgeously spooky "Kuroneko" (either way, Criterion was gonna get this spot...), but the loving portrait of the family in "Still Walking" and the oodles of humanity the film exudes give it the nudge. I believe this also made my 2010 list as I was anticipating it so much. My thirst has been quenched.

Chris MaGee's Top 5 Favorite Films of 2011

Each year the J-Film Pow-Wow picks our top films from the previosu 12 months. This year is no different, so during the next few weeks keep checking back for lists of which films captured the imaginations of our contributors. We kick things off with Chris MaGee's top picks of 2011!

*Note: This has been a very busy year, both professionally and personally for the crew of the J-Film Pow-Wow. Both matthew Hardstaff and Bob Turnbull have had life impinge on marathon moviegoing sessions throughout the year, so they will be chiming in with their top DVD releases, so you can start racking up your credit cards as well as add to your must see list.


1. Kotoko (dir. Shinya Tsukamoto)

Director Shinya Tsukamoto has spent the last few years flirting with the mainstream. Sadly, efforts like "Tetsuo The Bullet Man" and the "Nightmare Detective" films felt more like a compromise than an artistic progression. What had happened to the Tsukamoto to frightened us with "Haze" or enticed us with "Vital"? Well, that Tsukamoto is back. Teaming up with his artistic muse, singer/ songwriter Cocco, Tsukamoto has produced a profoundly beautiful and disturbing portrait of one woman's struggle with mental illness. Self-mutilation, terrifying delusions and infanticide -- "Kotoko" is not an easy watch by any stretch, but it is a cinematic experience unlike any of us had this year, or in recent memory.


2. Wandering Home/ 酔いがさめたら、うちに帰ろう。 (dir. Yoichi Higashi)

Yoichi Higashi, the man who brought us the award-winning coming-of-age drama "Village of Dreams", had been absent from feature filmmaking for seven years, and many wondered when, or if, the 76-year-old director would step behind the camera again. "Wandering Home", the story of a fatal alcoholic and his struggle to get sober, finally broke Higashi's silence, and I for one am very happy. Tadanobu Asano, starring as real-life photojournalist Yutaka Kamoshida, delivers one of the best performances of his career; but besides some delerium tremens hallucinations there is no showy filmmaking here. "Wandering Home" is just a rock solid story about a very human struggle.


3. Milocrorze: A Love Story/ ミロクローゼ (dir. Yoshimasa Ishibashi)

For the past decade clips from TV Tokyo's late night comedy series "Vermilion Pleasure Night" have become viral sensations on Youtube. Now ten years later Yoshimasa Ishibashi, the man who brought us such zany clips as the One Point English Lesson and Oh Mikey!, delivers a full length feature film that further ups the zaniness ante. Interweaving three comic tales "Milocrorze: A Love Story" doesn't just win us over with laughs, but with wild creativity. Take a look at the opening sequence about a boy who covers the hole in his heart with a pot lid or the astounding slow motion sword battle to see what I mean. Still, the heart of "Milocroze" are the multiple performances by Takayuki Yamada. It's hard to think of any actor in Japan who could disappear into roles as diverse and strange as an abusive relationship councilor or a love starved samurai.


4. Ringing in Their Ears/ 劇場版　神聖かまってちゃん　ロックンロールは鳴り止まないっ (dir. Yu Irie)

Japan's indie film scene is crowded with lethargic features centering around depressed and unemployed youth. Given that Japan has been suffering through a crippling economic crisis and this trend makes absolute sense. (The traumatic events and aftermath of March 11th only added to this bleakness). Still, it sometimes makes a movie lover pine for a film with energy and optimism... and we're not talking about the sappy variety of optimism on display in Japan's multiplex movie houses. 2011 saw an honest and uplifting film come from the indie scene -- Yu Irie's "Ringing in Their Ears". A trio of fictional stories are woven around real life indie rockers Shinsei Kamattechan, and the film climaxes in an electric live performance by the band.


5. No Reply/ 返事はいらない (dir. Satoru Hirohara)

Last year 24-year-old director Satoru Hirohara burst on to the international scene with his feature film "Good Morning to the World!!" This story of an isolated teen seeking out the owner of a lost satchel showed a lot of promise and ended up winning Hirohara the Dragons and Tigers Award at the 29th Vancouver International Film Festival. Still, "Good Morning" resembled many indie films by young Japanese directors. The question is whether Hirohara could follow through with another film. With "No Reply" Hirohara doesn't just follow through but totally outstrips his first feature. The slow single take, mid-shot aesthetic of “Good Morning to the World!!” is injected with true heart and soul with Hirohara introducing us to a young couple struggling with all the responsibilities that the word "love" brings.

Tokyo Filmex 2012 Report

For our full report on this year's Tokyo Filmex (November 19th to 27th) we thought we would tag team things a little bit, with Chris MaGee and Nicholas Vroman giving their own perspectives on this annual showcase of international filmmaking.


Chris MaGee's Report

This is my second year attending Tokyo Filmex and I'm glad to have seen another batch of great films (both from Japan and elsewhere) programmed for audiences. There were also some interesting parallels between films in this year's programme, although not all the films were as successful as others. The Japanese premiere of Toshiaki Toyoda's "Monsters Club" shared settings with the opening film of this year's Filmex, Kim Ki-Duk's "Arirang". Both are set in ramshackle cabins on the outskirts of civilization, but Ki-Duk's utterly self indulgent cinematic portrait was no match for Toyoda's beautiful protest film. Audiences were better served to attend the screening of imprisoned Iranian director Jafar Panahi's "This Is Not a Film", which may superficially have shared a concept with "Arirang", but had a much deeper meaning. As Nichiolas mentioned below, this is the J-Film Pow-Wow, so I'll quit my meandering and focus on what Tokyo Filmex had to offer Japanese film fans.

Japanese, or Japan set films, proved to be some of the hottest tickets at this year's Filmex. The film that packed the lobby of the Yurakucho Mullion Building to capacity was Iranian director Amir Naderi's Tokyo-set "Cut" starring Hidetoshi Nishijima. Not only was this Japanese premiere sold out, but tickets were actually being scalped for as much as ¥40,000 (nearly $500!). This cut of "Cut" (excuse the pun) was edited down by approximately 12-minutes from the version screened here in Toronto in September, and the good news is that it didn't lose anything from the trimming. This new edit of "Cut" simply tightens the story of a man literally fighting it out in the name of pure cinema. One very interesting piece of information about the film came out during the post-screening Q&A when Naderi revealed that the lead character of Shuji was actually inspired by American indie film legend John Cassavetes. This was news to star Hidetoshi Nishijima, who had grown up idolizing the "The Killing of a Chinese Bookie" and "A Woman Under the Influence" director.

Another hot ticket for Japanese film lovers was the Japanese premiere of Shinya Tsukamoto's "Kotoko". With its Orrizonti Prize win at this year's Venice Film Festival the advance buzz on "Kotoko" was significant, and while it didn't disappoint audiences it did leave them more than a little shell shocked. As was the case with the screening of the film at the Toronto International Film Festival, Tsukamoto amped up the sound levels for the Filmex screening. The ear-splitting sobs and screams of singer/ songwriter turned actress Cocco in the title role didn't have people walking out of the theatre, as they did in Toronto, but a few got out of their seats and clung to the walls, unsure whether they could take the barrage of sounds and images. "Kotoko" is definitely not an easy watch, but there was an added level of discomfort to this screening as not only Tsukamoto, but Cocco were in attendance. When I first saw the film in Toronto I was blown away by Cocco's performance, but I was unaware that many of the issues that the main character deals with are also ones that Cocco has struggled with over the years, namely cutting and anorexia. This added bit of autobiography made some of us more than a little concerned, while others found that this expanded their understanding of this raw, sublime film.

The biggest treat for fans of Japanese film at this year's Filmex had to be its full retrospective of the films of director Shinji Somai. Somai, who died at the tragically young age of 53 in 2001, is a filmmaker who is known more outside Japan for writing on his films rather than screenings of them. If it weren't for bootleg Hong Kong copies of his 1981 film "Sailor Suit and Machine Gun" his films would probably be entirely unseen in the West. This retrospective went a long way in remedying this, although maybe not as far as it should have. Of the 13 films screened only 4 were screened with English subtitles, an unusual turn of events as Filmex is fanous for fully subtitled retrospectives. Japanese and foreign critics have long lobbied for Somai to be better known internationally, but without subtitles and with certain prints of films from the early 90's already looking faded and worn, it's easy to see why this hasn't happened up to this point. Still, films like "The Catch", "Typhoon Club" and "Moving" (above) were revelations to many. Here's hoping that we see some kind of DVD set released by the folks at The Criterion Collection or Masters of Cinema sooner than later.

In the end it was Tibetan director Pema Tseden's "Old Dog" that was awarded the top prize by the Filmex jury (made up of director Amir Naderi, film critic Philippe Azoury, film scholar Soowan Jung, director Makoto Shinozaki and President of the Nicholas Ray Foundation Susan Ray). Meanwhile a student jury made up of Ryoko Kochi, Naoya Yamaguchi and Matsumi Kaji honoured Yosuke Okuda's first major film production "Tokyo Playboy Club" with a special Student Jury Prize.


Nicholas Vroman's Report

Tokyo Filmex seems like a family affair. That is your family includes a who’s who of contemporary filmmakers and film artists, a legion of Tokyo film buffs and an international cast of film writers, bookers, translators, movers and shakers. It just feels cozy and inclusive. There’s a particular indulgence of viewing a smartly curated selection of films by Shozo Ichiyama. Even if you don’t like them all, they tend to all fit into a clever puzzle of themes, associations and leitmotifs, making the festival itself seem a seamless whole.

Another of the pleasures of the festival is that it brings comrades and collaborators from far and wide. I had the distinct pleasure of having Chris MaGee spend a few nights on my apartment floor and days tag-teaming it to catch films.

I saw a mess of international films – a few terrible ones, a few ma ma, several good ones and at least one brilliant one (Nick Ray’s 1972 “We Can’t Go Home Again”). But as this is the J-Film Pow-Wow, here’s a quick report on films Japanese.


The Catch

I know that Chris has already weighed in most eloquently on Shinji Shomai’s “The Catch,” but a few comments seem to be in order. From the opening scene that introduces Shomai’s wild camera pan/zoom/truck/crane technics, like most in the darkened house, my mouth was agape with an oh-my-god sort of awe. Several other set pieces throughout the film with the god-like camera floating over water, twisting and turning over the prows of boats, across quays and back again made me wonder if the film was more about impossible camera setups or the somewhat old-fashioned proletarian “Islands In the Stream” story of taciturn and shochu- fueled men men men against the sea. Perhaps I prefer my crazy camera work a little less tainted by plot. Give me Michael Snow most days (even though Snow does play with tainted plots). But there were times in “The Catch” where the figuring out of how the hell he did that shot overwhelmed the drunken drama that was being played out. The film’s ostensible documentary veracity, played against the increasingly melodramatic plotline, made for one of the more novel cinematic experiences of my life. I’m still in awe of and questioning the arcane and retrograde method of catching tuna – long lines drawn in by hand and when the behemoth is finally pulled to the edge of the boat, it being bludgeoned to death. Haven’t they every heard of winches? Or fishing poles? No wonder these guys are so messed up. The images and actions in “The Catch” seem to come from some sort of strange otherworld. Even John Huston’s stylized translation of “Moby Dick,” with Gregory Peck’s overwrought Ahab seems to have more connection with the things of this world than the seemingly more realistic world of “The Catch” which comes off like science fiction.

CUT

Of course, Emir Naderi’s “CUT” was the big ticket of the festival. Naderi, with his outsized and generous personality was the head of the festival jury and seemed to be everywhere at the festival, glad-handing and joking – a kind of crazy fun Iranian bachelor uncle you wish you had type. His film was getting the big hype for low-budget art house fodder (Note: I have been a small part of the hype machine with an article I wrote more than a year ago about a visit to the set of “CUT”). The brutal intensity of the film more than lived up to expectations. The lack of dramatic curvature, though, made the parable about the suffering of the artist-cinephile a bit of a slog. And in the penultimate scene where a countdown of 100 great films punctuate the seemingly endless beating one is left with more of an intellectual release rather than an emotional one. What twisted my mind and left me squirming more after the houselights went up was Naderi’s simultaneous critique and exploitation of the idea of violence as entertainment. The direct pleasure of men beating up another man versus the higher aesthetics of cinema art was laid on display for the audience to “enjoy” voyeuristically in a high art film that was laden with violence. It makes the mind boggle.

Monsters Club

A couple of buddies were put off by Monster’s Club opening scenes where our hero, a younger, richer and more fashionable Ted Kaczynski (as played by Eita) goes through his hermetic routines - which mainly include sending mail bombs to owners of media conglomerates - in his Hallmark perfect winter cabin. His voice over mouths anarcho-primitivist screeds. They felt that filmmaker Toshiaki Toyoda was in agreement with the sentiments voiced. He may well be, but between Eita’s incongruous (and great) haircut and his character’s acknowledged privileged I felt that he was more of a 3rd Generation type and his motives completely up to question. As his madness ensues he does become a monster, delivering his last payload to the crowded streets of Tokyo – bringing a metaphorical and literal winter with him. Monster’s Club was disturbing, visionary and uneven. The literalizing of his demons was a bit overdone, but the nod toward JLG had a particular resonance. The bigger reference to Kenji Miyazawa, children’s book author and poet may have been a bit too Japanese culture specific to translate beyond borders, but even without the cultural reference the final voice over poem throws the whole thing into a more enigmatic and resonant place. Toyoda’s mixing it up with performance artist Pyuupiru, musician KenKen and a host of others show a generosity of spirit that’s visible in the final result. It’s good to see Toyoda, after his abysmal stoner slog, “The Blood of Rebirth,” finding a bit of footing on a new rocky trail – exploring, taking chances and creating interesting new work.

KOTOKO

Most problematic was “KOTOKO.” (above) Like “CUT,” not only was the title all in caps, but gushers of blood stained the screen through most of the running time. In KOTOKO’s case the boundary between fiction and fact were completely upended. “KOTOKO” follows the story of a woman, played by Okinawan singer Cocco, going mad. The manifestations of her madness include hallucinating doppelgangers and non-existent personages along with self-mutilation (cutting in this case) and anorexia – something that the real life actress is known for. She appeared on stage before the screening with director Shinya Tsukamoto, a scary image of walking death, spaced out (on meds?) and nearly incoherent. It was a sad sight. Tsukamoto appears to be genuinely in love with her – not only visible from his appearance in the movie as her potential savior, but even in the Q and A afterwards, it was pretty obvious. KOTOKO’s story was developed from Cocco’s ideas and whether the film exists as some sort of insane therapy session masquerading as a movie or an uber-Polanski exploration into troubled behavior is up to question. It seems that both director and subject are in an extreme enabling stage. Despite the visceral and unrelenting affect of the film (Tsukemoto certainly knows how to put together a film) one wonders if it may be better for Cocco to get some professional help soon.

No Man's Zone

“No Man’s Zone” is Toshi Fujiwara’s documentary meditation on the disaster in Tohoku. If Cocco wears the marks of her self-mutilation on her forearms, Fujiwara wears his Markerisms on his sleeve. Even the voice over by Arsinée Khanjian sounded uncannily like Sandra Stewart, the voice on the English language version of “Sans Soleil.” There was coy set of questions and statements about what you were looking at. A Where’s Waldo “whoops you missed what you should have been looking at” turned with increasing gravity to “the thing you should be looking at – radiation – you can’t see.” For a film that’s about trifecta of earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown, it’s surprisingly beautiful. The landscapes and still lives of the massive destruction of 3.11 give way to the revival of spring and nature reclaiming the devastated land. But the radiation has made the place a “No Man’s Zone.” Tarkovsky was prescient on this one! Fujiwara’s haunting images of empty and emptying towns serve as a document, a remembrance to our own follies. Where Marker builds his critique of images and documentary truth with trove of historical, and cinematic references and a lifetime of knowledge, Fujiwara tends to shorthand his seemingly pithy third person commentary, leaving the experience of No Man’s Land a bit of a didactic exercise. But as one of the first films that attempts to make some sense of the endless images of destruction and rapidly developing mediated myth of stoic and hardworking Japanese coming to terms with yet another disaster, at least “No Man’s Zone” is trying to look at things with fresh eyes with a certain anger and sadness that says, “Look at this and remember.”

Our top ten picks for best actors/ actresses of this generation

by Chris MaGee

Loving film isn't just about the mechanics of its construction -- the cinematography, direction, lighting and editing. Far from it. What draws so many of us intro the theatre again and again are compelling characters. It's these heroes and villains, femme fatales and screwballs who people the screen that shape our relationship with film. There have been so many unforgettable characters who have come to us from Japanese film, created by a cast of iconic actors -- Toshiro Mifune, Tatsuya Nakadai, Machiko Kyo, Kinuyo Tanaka and Rentaro Mikuni, amongst many others. These legendary stars have come to us from Japan's Golden Age of filmmaking, but what about the actors and actresses of this generation? There is so much talk in Hollywood about how stars like Sean Penn, Russell Crowe, Meryl Streep and Naomi Watts are "the greatest actors of their generation", but what about their counterparts in Japan? This is a topic we've debated about here at The J-Film Pow-Wow for some time now, and we're finally putting our opinions on the line with our list of the ten actors and actresses from Japan who we feel have not only defined our idea of Japanese film in the past 15 years, but those who also have the potential to continue to bring Japanese film to the rest of the world.


10. Shido Nakamura

The first actor on our list is one of two who were born into the world of kabuki theatre. Shido Nakamura, technically Shido Nakamura II, was born into the venerable Nakamura family of kabuki actors in 1972. The son of Shido Nakamura I, the then named Mikihiro Ogawa made his stage debut at the young age of 8. It was shortly thereafter that he took his kabuki stage name. Nakamura hasn't always been comfortable going along with the family business though. While still appearing on in kabuki plays Nakamura studied at the Nihon University School of Drama, but dropped out after becoming fascinated with music. for a time Nakamura would bounce from kabuki to indie rock, but by the age of 30 Nakamura's career would move from the stage to the screen. In 2002 he would star as Dragon, a super talented and near psychopathic competitive ping pong player in Fumihiko Sori's live-action adaptation of Taiyō Matsumoto's manga "Ping Pong". This role, a more animalistic than human performance, won Nakamura Best Actor nods from the Japanese Academy Awards, The Blue Ribbon Awards and The Mainichi Film Concours. Since then Nakamura has brought both a theatrical ferocity and a cinematic subtlety to roles in such films as Yasuo Inoue's "Neighbour No. 13" and Junya Sato's "The Men of the Yamato", as well as providing the voice for shinigami Ryuuk. Nakamura has also branched out into international production's such as Jet Li's action film "Fearless", Clint Eastwood's WW2 drama "Letters from Iwo Jima" and John Woo's historical epic "Red Cliff" (above).


9. Masatoshi Nagase

Most Japanese film actors first gain fame at home and then branch out to overseas productions. 45-year-old actor Masatoshi Nagase's career has taken the exact opposite trajectory. Granted, Nagase first came to public attention in only one American film, but what a film -- Jim Jarmusch's 1989 indie classic "Mystery Train". In that film Nagase starred opposite Youki Kudoh as a rockabilly obsessed Japanese tourist who comes to Memphis to discover the roots of Elvis Presley. This international success was followed only two years later back home in Japan when Nagase would star in one of his best known and most critically-praised roles. In Yoji Yamada's 1991 film "My Sons", Nagase played Tetsuo, the troubled son of an elderly tobacco farmer, played by Rentaro Mikuni. This role would win him a slew of Best Supporting Actor awards from the Japanese Academy Awards, The Blue Ribbon Awards, The Kinema Junpo Awards and The Mainichi Film Concours. Since "My Sons" Nagase has made his career playing an almost schizophrenic array of roles, bringing a stoic believability to the gumshoe detective in Kaizo Hayashi's "Maiku Hama" trilogy, an assassin in Seijun Suzuki's wildly surreal "Pistol Opera" and an incestuous brother in Daihachi Yoshida's "Funuke Show Some Love, You Losers!" While Nagase has not appeared in any major American film since "Mystery Train" (he had a small role in Hal Hartley's 1995 film "Flirt") he has starred in two films that, although radically different, have cemented Nagase in the minds of Western audiences. One was as Thunderbolt Buddha, the villain in Sogo Ishii's 2001 cult hit "Electric Dragon 80,000 V", and the other as low-ranking samurai Munezo Katagiri in 2004's "The Hidden Blade" (above), helmed by "My Sons" director Yoji Yamada. Nagase is still pushing, still morphing himself into new characters. For one of his most recent roles in the Shochiku drama "Every Day Mother" Nagase starved himself, losing an astounding 26 lbs in only two weeks, to play a man suffering from cancer.



8. Makiko Watanabe

There will be a few faces on this list that you know you have seen before, but never knew their names. Given that an actors job is to transform themselves into various characters we think this is the most important criteria for inclusion on our list. One such actress Makiko Watanabe. You'd be forgiven if you are struggling to place her, but this 43-year-old has appeared in supporting roles in such well known films as Takashi Miike's "Zebraman", Naomi Kawase's "The Mourning Forest" and Sion Sono's "Love Exposure". While Watanabe, a former fashion model, may have shone in these supporting roles it has been her work in smaller, indie productions that puts her on our list of favorite actors and actresses. Starting out on the screen in 1988 in the Tetsuya Nakashima directed segment of "Bakayaro! I'm Plenty Mad", Watanabe has become one of the go-to actresses in Japan's independent film scene. Her first major success was starring as a conflicted career woman in Nobuhiro Suwa's "M/Other". Her work on the semi-improvised film led to her and co-star Tomokazu Miura receiving writing credits on the script and ultimately sharing the Best Screenplay Award at the 2000 Mainichi Film Concours with director Suwa. Over time Watanabe has come to perfect her depictions of damaged women. In 2007 she would star opposite director Masahiro Kobayashi in his film "The Rebirth" (above). In this subtle drama Watanabe portrays the mother of a boy who killed his female classmate. It's her desire to apologize to the girl's father, played by Kobayashi. This complex central conflict would lead to "The Rebirth"taking home The Golden Leopard, the top prize at The Locarno International Film Festival. Watanabe would go on to star in Daisuke Yamaoka's equally compelling drama, "Lost Girl", in which Watanabe stars as a chef, who due to relationship strain and fear of failure, has become a bulimic. Very difficult roles, but ones that Makiko Watanabe seems to pull off almost effortlessly.


7. Fusako Urabe

We believe that the next two actors on our list, although not particularly well known yet, really do represent some of the best up-and-coming talent Japan has to offer. Chiba Prefecture-native Fusako Urabe has been acting since her school days, receiving the National High School Theatre Competition for Best Actress when she was only 14. Now 33 Urabe is best known by mainstream Japanese audiences for her roles in such NHK TV dramas as "Anti-Terrorism Investigators" and "The Auditor", as well as sporting her trademark pixy haircut in commercials for Febreze and Canon digital cameras. Urabe's talent is far more powerful than this material though, but you have to dig a little outside the big studio films to savour it. Urabe is probably best known on the international art house circuit for her lead role in Masahiro Kobayashi's 2005 film "Bashing" (above). In that film she gives a tortured performance as a young Japanese foreign aide worker who, after having been held by Iari insurgents, is returned to her home country only to be met with shame and derision for her captivity. Urabe's role in "Bashing" soon had the best of Japan's indie and student films scene knocking at her door. She has gone on to deliver understated but utterly captivating performances as lonely, eccentric women in such films as Tokyo Univeristy of the Arts graduate Ryusuke Hamaguchi's relationship drama "Passion", as well as in screenwriter Aki Sato's debut film "emerger". Along with her work in Japanese theatre, Fusako Urabe is a formidable talent who stands apart from the crew of pretty actresses/ models/ singers/ tarento that populate the showbiz landscape of Japan.


6. Hirofumi Arai

There are plenty of heartthrob actors in Japan, men (and often time boys) who portray the heroes, the superstars and the boyfriends in the latest manga adaptation or TV spin-off film. What there are not a lot of in Japan are actors like Hirofumi Arai, artists who aren't afraid to be dangerous, frightening, less than heroic and in some cases downright ugly (although more inside than out). It seems like 32-year-old Arai has built his career on these types of characters though. A third generation Korean Japanese from Aomori Prefecture, Arai first wowed audiences with two powerful performances in 2001, one in Isao Yukisada's "Go" and the other opposite Ryuhei Matsuda in Toshiaki Toyoda's "Blue Spring". In the former Arai had a chance to explore his Korean heritage as a disenfranchised zainichi teen, while in the latter he took his character from being a naive high schooler to a terrifying street thug.It's important to note that Arai was only 19 at the time he filmed both these projects. It's true that since that time Arai has done his fair share of roles on TV dramas, but he has also given birth to a plethora of wonderfully flawed characters -- The school bully who becomes the hero of Yasuo Inoue's "Neighbour No. 13", the adult son of a sociopathic patriarch of a Korean family in Osaka in Yoichi Sai's "Blood and Bones", a boxer who is wrongfully accused and convicted of a murderer in Banmei Takahashi's "Box: The Hakamada Case". Even in the smallest role Arai can become instantly memorable. One only needs to see his brief courtroom scene in Ryosuke Hashiguchi's "All Around Us" as a man standing trial for killing a group of elementary school children to know what we mean. Arai probably pushed the envelope further than anyone on this list with Tasuhi Omori's independent film "Whispering of the Gods" which saw his character involved in graphic onscreen sex and violence. The film proved to controversial to submit to Japanese censors, so its producer made the decision to screen it in an alternative venue -- a tent in Ueno Park.


5. Kenichi Matsuyama

Thanks to roles in such blockbuster films as "Death Note: The Last Name", "Kaiji" and "Gantz" Ken'ichi Matsuyama has become a Pan-Asian superstar, but there's something that sets this 26-year-old actor apart from many of the tarento on screen in Japan. That's his acting chops. While Matsuyama got his start in show business at the age of 16 via a model search audition sponsored by Japanese department store Parco it didn't take him long to do more in front of the camera than just look pretty. A year after winning the model search Matsuyama was cast in the NTV series "Gokusen" and very quickly he migrated from the small screen to the large. First there was a small part in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's 2003 film "Bright Future", but soon he was being cast in major roles, such as that of a young private on board the Imperial battleship Yamato in "The Men of the Yamato". Although this WW2 drama suffered from being a little overwrought Matsuyama stood out as a newcomer to watch. Above and beyond the wild success of Shusuke Kaneko's two "Death Note " films Matsuyama began to turn in more and more sophisticated performances in films like Koji Hagiuda's "Prodigy (Shindo)" and Yoshimitsu Morita's "Southbound". The role that proved that Matsuyama was much more than a pretty face, though, was in Toshio Lee's manga adaptation "Detroit Metal City". In his dual role as nebbish songwriter Soichi Negishi and death metal frontman Johannes Krauser II he got to show off his pitch perfect comic timing. There are few actors on our list that can pull off both drama and comedy, but with Matsuyama's performance in "Detroit Metal City" he proved he could tackle both. The role also got him nominated for Best Actor at the 2009 Japanese Academy Awards and won him the Most Popular Actor trophy. It also led him on to much more serious projects such as Tran Ahn Hung's "Norwegian Wood" (above).


4. Tae Kimura

Success as an actor, meaning steady work and praise for ones talent, is an elusive thing. May actors work at their craft for years before they begin to win accolades. Some never get their. One actress who worked long and hard perfecting her skills and finally gain fame is 40-year-old Tae Kimura. Kimura didn't actually start out as an actress. Instead she studied at the Showa College of Music, but upon graduation she took her talents to the stage in various musical productions. It was during this stage in her career that Kimura found herself working multiple part-time jobs to keep herself going. Starting in 1996 Kimura began to appear in numerous small roles on TV and the following year she made her big screen debut in Toho's slapstick comedy "Secret Garden", but success was still elusive. She would work on films with Hirokazu Koreeda ("After Life"), Shunji Iwai ("Hana & Alice") and Hideo Nakata ("Kaidan"), but a leading role continued to elude her. Everything changed in 2008 when she starred in Ryosuke Hashiguchi's marital drama "All Around Us" (above). Kimura was cast in the role of a clinically depressed wife, combining humour and heartbreak opposite Lily Franky as her courtroom artist husband. Suddenly Kimura went from bit parts to an awe inspiring feature role. Kimura soon found herself being named Best Actress at both the 2009 Japanese Academy Awards and The Blue Ribbon Awards. Since this career defining performance Kimura has gone on to star in a series of leading roles for such directors as Makoto Shinozaki, Hideaki Sato and Isshin Inudo. Regardless of where Kimura's career goes from here (and we can only hope that is onwards and upwards) her performance in "All Around Us" earns her a place at #4 on our list.


3. Takayuki Yamada

As we've already mentioned with our #5 pick, Ken'ichi Matsuyama, being both a gifted actor and a comedian is a very difficult thing. Matsuyama pulled it off in "Detroit Metal City", but one actor who has managed to consistently juggle pathos and laughter (sometimes in the same film) is 27-year-old Takayuki Yamada. The Kagoshima-born Yamada made his acting debut at 15 in the TV series "Psychometrer Eiji 2" after he was discovered shopping with his older sister. Throughout the subsequent six years Yamada would find himself growing in popularity on the small screen, but his star wouldn't really start to shine until 2005. That's when he found himself cast in the lead role of an otaku who saves a woman on the Tokyo Metro from a drunk. That film, "Densha Otoko (Train Man)" became a cultural phenomena in Japan. The story itself didn't vary much from the many Harlequin-esque films that flood the theatres in Japan each year, but what set "Densha Otoko" apart was Yamada. Like a latter-day Cary Grant, Yamada can be suave, cool and hilarious all at once. In the years since "Densha Otoko" he has done this time again again in films like Takashi Miike's "Crows Zero", Katsuhide Motoki's "Kamogawa Horumo" and Nobuo Mizuta's "Maiko haaaan!!!". Even sub par melodramas like "Ikigami: The Ultimate Limit" have been elevated by Yamada's pure screen charisma. The latest success for Yamada has been Yoshimasa Ishibashi's surreal comedy "Milocrorze: A Love Story" (above) in which Yamada doesn't play one, but three different roles -- an abusive relationship counsellor, a samurai on a quest to find his lost love and a boy who had his heart broken by a super model. From here on we can only guess at what Takayuki Yamada is capable of.


2. Shinobu Terajima

Japanese actresses have found themselves in a very difficult position in the past few years. More and more studios and talent agencies don;t just want their actresses up on the big screen. TV offers are always calling, but the most lucrative market often ends up being commercials and ad campaigns. The only drawback with this is that actresses and their agents feel that roles which are too sexy, too extreme or too challenging don't make for likable product spokespeople. Ultimately this means that female roles in Japanese films that push the envelope have grown few and far between. One actress who has refused to shy away from roles that may make shake up an audience is 38-year-old Shinobu Terajima. This most non-traditional of actresses actually came from a traditional acting family. Her father, Kikugoro Onoe, and brother are kabuki actors and her mother, Junko Fuji, is an actress and TV moderator. For her part Terajima studied at the Aoyama Gakuin University Faculty of Arts, but it was only a decade ago, when she was 28, that Terajima finally went from small stage roles to a full-fledged acting career, and since she has created a body of work that would make any actress, Japanese or otherwise, jealous. Right from the beginning, though, Terajima gravitated to projects that would scare other Japanese actresses to death. In her two breakthrough roles, 2003's surreal "Akame 48 Waterfalls", directed by Genjiro Arato and the indie drama "Vibrator", directed by Ryoichi Hiroki, Terajima would appear nude and act in numerous sex scenes. Thankfully the critics saw past this and both roles won Terajima praise, including the Japanese Academy Award for Best Actress for "Akame 48 Waterfalls". Terajima isn't an "erotic" film actress though. She regularly acts on television and on stage, but it's her controversial and powerful screen roles that continue to garner attention. Her role as the wife of a horribly disfigured WW2 veteran in Koji Wakamatsu's "Caterpillar" (above) not only won Terajima her second Japanese Academy Award for Best Actress, but also the prestigious Best Actress Award at the 2010 Berlin Film Festival.


1. Tadanobu Asano

It's hard to think of Japanese film in the past 15 years without thinking of Tadanobu Asano. For many film fans the 37-year-old actor has become the face of contemporary Japanese cinema, what with his starring roles in cult hits like "Ichi the Killer" and Takeshi Kitano's reboot "Zatoichi". Asano was born Tadanobu Sato, the son of a talent agent who thought it best his son go into the business. Soon renamed Asano, the young actor found himself cast for his unusual looks (he is a quarter Navajo on his mother's side). Watching Asano's early performances today, such as in Shunji Iwai's made-for-TV film "Fried Dragon Fish", it's hard to see how he has become one of Japan's most charismatic screen stars. He seemed to possess no screen presence. It almost felt like he had simply wandered in front of the camera. It was this persona that Asano has not only cultivated, but honed to a very particular acting style. Now he can communicate a wealth of thought and emotion with the barest of means, the polar opposite of an actor like Toshiro Mifune, who was known for his broad, physical technique. This less-is-more working method has served Asano well in everything from zany comedies like "The Taste of Tea" to serious dramas like "Wandering Home" (above). He's even taken his career overseas, starring in films in Thailand, Hong Kong, the U.S. and the former Soviet Union. What most interesting about Asano is that he's become the hottest actor in Japan by breaking the rules, or more accurately by simply ignoring them. While Asano has, like many actors in Japan, appeared in commercials for various companies, he has not gone the expected route of appearing on TV dramas or panel shows. He'd much rather play music with his bands Peace Pill and Safari, make art and work on his own clothing line. This "bad boy" attitude has famously won him the "Johnny Depp of Japan" tag; but comparing one of Hollywood's greatest actors of our generation to Japan's greatest is no faint praise.