Young Chang Hwang

River Returns

In 1958, as a deadly typhoon approaches, a young boy embarks on a perilous journey to a haunted mountain pool, determined to calm a sorrowful spirit whose grief has cursed the village with devastating floods.

River Returns

In 1958, as a deadly typhoon approaches, a young boy embarks on a perilous journey to a haunted mountain pool, determined to calm a sorrowful spirit whose grief has cursed the village with devastating floods.

There is a Stone

A young woman spends a day in some non-place between town and countryside, has random encounters and watches stones skip over the surface of the river. Tatsunari Ota’s film explores a world without productivity and finds joy in idle time and playfulness.

Remembering Every Night

A visit to the employment office, practicing dance steps, making music with friends: several women’s everyday lives are captured in long shots and with a superb sense of place. A film like a summer's day, bright, friendly, with the occasional chill.

Pianoforte

The world’s most talented young pianists compete in the International Chopin Piano Competition, held every five years in Warsaw, Poland. A rare behind the scenes look at the triumphant highs and crushing lows of competition, Pianoforte is both a testament to the remarkable power of music and an intimate coming-of-age portrait.

Plastic

After his shot at a record deal falls through, Jun transfers to sleepy Nagoya and begins busking songs by his favourite 1970s glam rock band, Exne Kedy. The music catches the eye of fellow fan Ibuki and the pair soon fall in love over their shared musical taste.

I'll Be Your Mirror

Newly commissioned short film, starring Tomona Hirota and Sumire Ashina.

Ring Wandering

In central Tokyo, a young man, Sosuke, aspires to be a manga artist. His current work is about a battle between a hunter and a Japanese wolf. He can’t draw the extinct wolf well and struggles to develop the story. One winter’s day, Sosuke finds an animal’s skull while digging foundations at a construction site and takes it home. Is it a Japanese wolf’s skull?

Videophobia

A young woman discovers that a sex tape made without her knowledge is circulating online. Paranoia takes over, along with a sense of injustice. Her sudden terror of video triggers a downward spiral where she loses all social bearings.

Domains

Aki and Naoko are childhood friends who are drifting apart as adults. Immersed in her family life, Naoko now has a husband and daughter; Aki, on the other hand, remains single and is on leave from work due to a personal crisis. The plot might sound familiar but it has never been told like this. The director Kusano Natsuka stages the interactions through an actors’ table-read and, as the lines are repeated, the scenes gradually develop into on-location conversations. Moreover, she repositions the dramatic peak of the story to the beginning: Aki has murdered Naoko’s daughter.

Listen to Light

Shiori, Yukiko, Kyoko and Sachiko continue to live each day with untold feelings inside. Unable to forget a colleague on a trip, a father who is ill, a friend who works at a store that is about to close, and a long-lost husband, each woman takes a step forward. There is a light that sometimes embraces them, calmly and gently.

Good Bye, Talking Dog

Reiko teaches at an acting school while working as an actress. Her career has stalled, but she gets a chance to appear in a feature film from a theater group friend who is now a famous actor. Reiko is elated, but then she gets a call from her mother Yukie.

The Albino's Trees

A poignant moral dilemma unfolding against lush mountainous landscapes, The Albino’s Trees follows Yuku (Ryohei Matsuoka), an animal control hunter who takes on a lucrative job to kill a rare white deer considered to be a god of the forest by a nearby village. Though Yuku initially steps up to the task in order to support his mother’s medical bills, his will begins to falter as he gets to know the villagers and the reasons behind their difficult choice to live as outsiders.

THE COCKPIT

In a small cockpit-like room, we see two young hip hop musicians from Tokyo giving birth to a beat: precision, patience and camaraderie hold sway, midway between an installation and sitcom.

遠くの水

Yukiko comes to Tokyo from Ehime and continues to live in a place where she knows nobody. One day, she happens to meet a young man who comes and goes from her workplace.

Storytellers

The third part of a trilogy focusing on the Tohoku region that is comprised of dialogues with victims of the Great East Japan Earthquake. Ideas on how to share experiences of the disaster with future generations, a challenge touched upon in the previous films The Sound of Waves and Voices from the Waves, is found in folk tales from the region. Co-directed by Sakai Ko and Hamaguchi Ryusuke.

The Sound of Waves

The first part of a trilogy focusing on the northeast Tohoku region, co-directed by Sakai Ko and Hamaguchi Ryusuke. Impromptu interviews were carried out with disaster victims mainly along the Sanriku Coast, which had been ravaged by tsunamis several times prior to the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011, and makes emotional discoveries within dialogues between close-knit people including families and workmates.

A Song I Remember

At a train station in the suburbs of Tokyo, an accident takes place causing death and injury. Tsuyoshi is at the scene and witnesses the death of a woman. Right before the accident occurred, Tsuyoshi took a photograph of the woman, who carried a gentle look. Later, Tsuyoshi learns the woman has a daughter named Kiriko. Tsuyoshi meets Kiriko.

くじけないで手紙を書いた

The poet Koichi Masuno always goes to his friends to give them his poetry collection "Kujikena", which is about to be published.

Tochka

A woman and a man meet on an abandoned tochka along the seashore in Hokkaido, Japan.

Tochka

A woman and a man meet on an abandoned tochka along the seashore in Hokkaido, Japan.

河の恋人

A day in the life of Kiriko, who has not told anyone about her father's disappearance.