The 40th Pia Film Festival lived up to its mascot’s image – a joyful and replete Vamos, designed by Rie Suzuki, which does not simply enjoy cinema but also seems to know all its angles.
Launched in 1977, Pia Film Festival was originally programmed in order to introduce and nurture young, promising film directors and create a gateway to higher stages of their upcoming careers. Pff distributes and actively promotes selected titles throughout Japan, which are then being screened at various theaters, on television, as well as sent international festivals or released on DVD/Bd, so that they may reach wider audience. The filmmaker who possesses the best future potential is selected from among current year’s Pff Award winners and receives the honorary Pff Award (Grand Prize), which apart from the financial remuneration provides a chance to make history at Tokyo International Film Festival. The total entries number starting from...
Launched in 1977, Pia Film Festival was originally programmed in order to introduce and nurture young, promising film directors and create a gateway to higher stages of their upcoming careers. Pff distributes and actively promotes selected titles throughout Japan, which are then being screened at various theaters, on television, as well as sent international festivals or released on DVD/Bd, so that they may reach wider audience. The filmmaker who possesses the best future potential is selected from among current year’s Pff Award winners and receives the honorary Pff Award (Grand Prize), which apart from the financial remuneration provides a chance to make history at Tokyo International Film Festival. The total entries number starting from...
- 10/5/2018
- by Nikodem Karolak
- AsianMoviePulse
After growing up in Aomori and graduating from college, Thunder Sawada held jobs working for a land shark, customer support, and freelance writing before beginning his career as a contemporary artist. In 2007, he received the Taro Okamoto Contemporary Art Award, and in 2012 completed his studies at the Graduate School of Film and New Media, Tokyo University of the Arts. He won the Isama Studio Film Festival Scenario Award in 2010 and 2015.
Yuya Takagawa was Born in 1962 in Mie Prefecture. He is an actor, narrator and theatre director working in theatre, TV and film who began his acting career at Tatsuya Nakadai’s Mumeijuku acting school. He has appeared in films such as 13 Assassins (2010) by Takashi Miike and was recently in Rolling (2015) by Masanori Tominaga, Lost Serenade(2016) by Masato Ozawa and Alley Cat by Hideo Sasaki (Japan Cuts 2017), among others. He is the lead actor in Dream of Illumination.
On the occasion of their film,...
Yuya Takagawa was Born in 1962 in Mie Prefecture. He is an actor, narrator and theatre director working in theatre, TV and film who began his acting career at Tatsuya Nakadai’s Mumeijuku acting school. He has appeared in films such as 13 Assassins (2010) by Takashi Miike and was recently in Rolling (2015) by Masanori Tominaga, Lost Serenade(2016) by Masato Ozawa and Alley Cat by Hideo Sasaki (Japan Cuts 2017), among others. He is the lead actor in Dream of Illumination.
On the occasion of their film,...
- 7/26/2018
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
The 17th annual New York Asian Film Festival closed July 15 after two weeks of boasting four world premieres, 21 North American premieres, and 12 New York premieres. Produced by Subway Cinema and the Film Society at Lincoln Center, the Nyaff aims to showcase Asian cinematic excellence, and to expose audiences to non-Eurocentric, emotionally compelling, and provocative Asian film. The festival kicked off June 29 with the North American premiere of celebrated Japanese director Masanori Tominaga’s “Dynamite Graffiti,” an idiosyncratic drama about the Japanese pornography publisher Suei Akira. For its closing, the festival chose box office darling Erik Matti’s “BuyBust,” an action film starring megawatt actor Anne Curtis and Mma world champion Brandon Vera, all of whom attended the screening. The festival also delivers awards, this year honoring Hong Kong’s Dante Lam with a Daniel A. Craft Award for Excellence in Action Cinema. The festival’s schedule included a special screening...
- 7/16/2018
- backstage.com
The Japanese films in this year’s edition of the New York Asian Film Festival are typically eclectic and mostly accomplished, ranging from fresh takes on period films, dark and often disturbing depictions of high school life, to bold takes on genre films. In this fest dispatch, I consider a few notable selections. ----- "Art is an explosion." This is the faux-profound and mockingly pretentious mantra repeated in voiceover by Akira Suei (Tasuku Emoto), the subject of Nyaff opener Dynamite Graffiti,(top), Masanori Tominaga's lengthy biopic of Suei, the notorious porn-mag publisher whose publications - with such innocuous titles as Weekend Super, New Self, and Photo Age - were ubiquitous...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 7/11/2018
- Screen Anarchy
Masanori Tominaga, known from his documentary “The Echo of Astro Boy’s Footsteps” (2011) about Matsuo Ohno and narratives like “Pandora’s Box” (2009), which was based on a story written by Osamu Dazai, returns to the silver screen with a biopic about Akira Suei, Japan’s famous erotic-magazine editor. Even though the erotic images – including the work of Nobuyoshi Araki – were the main attraction of New Self, Weekend Super, and Shashin Jidai, these magazines also featured articles about various underground cultural phenomena and the work of distinguished writers like Genpei Akasegawa and Shigesato Itio. Now, With Tominaga’s adaptation of Suei’s biographical essay “Suteki na Dainamaito Sukyandaru” (1982), we finally get a chance to explore the life of one of the most controversial editors of the eighties.
Dynamite Graffity is screening at the 17th New York Asian Film Festival
It took only one explosion to radically change the subjective trajectory of...
Dynamite Graffity is screening at the 17th New York Asian Film Festival
It took only one explosion to radically change the subjective trajectory of...
- 7/1/2018
- by Pieter-Jan Van Haecke
- AsianMoviePulse
With the summer heat on full blast this coming weekend in New York, patrons of the five burroughs may want to consider the cool and also very hip insides of a movie theater for proper retreat and enjoyment. And what better way to do this than attend the latest edition of a true NYC film culture staple: The New York Asian Film Festival! Rising from the depths of cinephillia of the far east, Nyaff roars across the city Friday, June 29 to Friday... July 15! Opening night rolls out the North American Premiere of Masanori Tominaga's Dynamite Graffiti. Jumping to ol' 15, closing night gives us the World Premiere of Erik Matti's BuyBust, a social realist action film on the drug war in the Phillipennes....
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 6/28/2018
- Screen Anarchy
With the summer heat on full blast this coming weekend in New York, patrons of the five burroughs may want to consider the cool and also very hip insides of a movie theater for proper retreat and enjoyment. And what better way to do this than attend the latest edition of a true NYC film culture staple: The New York Asian Film Festival! Rising from the depths of cinephillia of the far east, Nyaff roars across the city Friday, June 29 to Friday... July 15! Opening night rolls out the North American Premiere of Masanori Tominaga's Dynamite Graffiti. Jumping to ol' 15, closing night gives us the World Premiere of Erik Matti's BuyBust, a social realist action film on the drug war in the Phillipennes....
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 6/28/2018
- Screen Anarchy
Told from the perspective of the main female protagonist as she deals with work and relationships, “Pumpkin and Mayonnaise” is a fantastic drama about what happens when couples find their lives pulled in different directions. Director Masanori Tominaga crafts a simple yet believable story that deals with a number of social issues affecting modern people, with the pressures of money, time, and even love, being a constant theme.
Pumpkin and Mayonnaise is screening at Nippon Connection
Tsuchida (Asami Usuda) is living with her long-term boyfriend Seiichi (Taiga) who is struggling to make ends meet as a singer-songwriter. In order to help him, Tsuchida begins work as a hostess, a job where she can earn good money by drinking with men in a somewhat sexualized environment. When one of the men tells her she can make even more money by coming with him to his hotel, she decides to take the risk.
Pumpkin and Mayonnaise is screening at Nippon Connection
Tsuchida (Asami Usuda) is living with her long-term boyfriend Seiichi (Taiga) who is struggling to make ends meet as a singer-songwriter. In order to help him, Tsuchida begins work as a hostess, a job where she can earn good money by drinking with men in a somewhat sexualized environment. When one of the men tells her she can make even more money by coming with him to his hotel, she decides to take the risk.
- 6/2/2018
- by Matthew Cooper
- AsianMoviePulse
The program of the 18th Japanese Film Festival Nippon Connection in Frankfurt am Main is complete! From May 29 to June 3, 2018 the audience can discover more than 100 new short and feature films at the biggest festival for Japanese film worldwide – from blockbusters and anime to independent and documentary films. Almost all of the films will be presented as German, European- international, or world premieres. A diverse supporting program provides about 50 exciting cultural activities apart from the cinema. Numerous Japanese filmmakers, musicians, and artists will be our guests at the festival. As the guest of honor, renowned actress Shinobu Terajima will receive the Nippon Honor Award 2018. The events will take place at the festival centers at Künstlerhaus Mousonturm and Theater Willy Praml in der Naxoshalle as well as four additional locations in Frankfurt am Main.
Nippon Cinema
Once more, many stars of the Japanese film scene will be expected to present...
Nippon Cinema
Once more, many stars of the Japanese film scene will be expected to present...
- 5/16/2018
- by Adriana Rosati
- AsianMoviePulse
Masanori Tominaga's The Pavillion Salamandre just came out of nowhere. It went by completely unnoticed on its initial release, the addition of Jo Odagiri being the only hook that put this film on the radar of a select few in the West. Looking back after watching the film, it's not difficult to see why they didn't even bother to promote it over here, but that shouldn't stop you from seeking it out when you have the chance. The experience alone is worth the gamble. If the name Tominaga sounds familiar, it's because I've written several reviews for Mai Tominaga's films (Wool 100%, Rinco's Restaurant) in the past. While I haven't been able to figure out any clear connection between the two directors, judging from their...
- 10/26/2011
- Screen Anarchy
It's been a couple of days since I checked out the Masanori Tominaga-directed oddball comedy Vengeance Can Wait, and I'm still not sure how I feel about it. It features a quartet of characters, each of who with wildly varying levels of emotional plausibility in a set of circumstances that move from quirky, to uncomfortable, to straight-out farcical by the end of the movie. The plot appeals as much as it repulses, which can likewise be said for the characters who run the spectrum of unlikeability. But I'm not sure this last point is really a mark against the movie, which doesn't seem to seek sympathy with so much as understanding for the quartet that form the basis of the plot. That plot involves the...
- 7/19/2011
- Screen Anarchy
The trailer for Masanori Tominaga‘s Ranbou to Taiki has been released slightly ahead of schedule exclusively via the Japanese film site Cinema Cafe. The film is based on a 2005 play by Yukiko Motoya. In 2008, she adapted it to a novel with illustrations by longtime Gainax animator and protegé of Hideaki Anno, Kazuya Tsurumaki.
The film revolves around a man named Hidenori (Tadanobu Asano) and woman named Nanase (Minami) who share an intense and bizarre relationship. Although the two are not actually related in any way, Nanase calls Hidenori “Onii-chan” (older brother) and the two sleep on a bunk bed. Their living arrangement began in the wake of an accident, and Nanase has spent 10 years waiting for Hidenori to take the revenge on her she feels she deserves.
Their relationship changes when Takao (Takayuki Yamada) and his pregnant wife Azusa (Eiko Koike) move into the neighborhood. While peeping through a...
The film revolves around a man named Hidenori (Tadanobu Asano) and woman named Nanase (Minami) who share an intense and bizarre relationship. Although the two are not actually related in any way, Nanase calls Hidenori “Onii-chan” (older brother) and the two sleep on a bunk bed. Their living arrangement began in the wake of an accident, and Nanase has spent 10 years waiting for Hidenori to take the revenge on her she feels she deserves.
Their relationship changes when Takao (Takayuki Yamada) and his pregnant wife Azusa (Eiko Koike) move into the neighborhood. While peeping through a...
- 4/29/2010
- Nippon Cinema
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