Fashion fans won’t want to miss L’amour fou (2010; pictured), a documentary on late designer Yves Saint-Laurent and his longtime lover and business partner, Pierre Berge. The film follows the designer’s long career, which started him as assistant to Christian Dior in the ’50s. Berge would help Saint-Laurent overcome his shyness to become one of ...
The touching family documentary Sona, the Other Myself (2009; pictured) is screening at Pole Pole (4-4-1 Higashi Nakano, Nakano-ku; www.mmjp.or.jp/pole2) through April 22. The film is directed by Yong-hi Yang, a second-generation Korean in Osaka, whose pro-Pyongyang brothers immigrated to North Korea, bringing along a niece, Sona, whose life mirrors that of the director’s in ...
Classical music fans will want to head to Bunkamura’s Le Cinema (2-24-1 Dogenzaka, Shibuya-ku; www.bunkamura.co.jp) to check out Mozart’s Sister (2010; pictured), a French-language biopic on Maria Anna Mozart, playing from April 9. The famed composer idolized his older sister, who inspired him to begin studying music, and he would later compose works specifically to ...
One of the titans of 20th-century cinema, Eric Rohmer, is the subject of an all-night tribute at Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro on April 9 (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com). The screening focuses on later works by the French New Wave pioneer, who passed away last year at the age of 89. Boyfriends and Girlfriends (1987) is ...
Fans of Japanese period films will want to head to Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com), where the first four Lone Wolf and Cub films (1972; pictured) will be shown in an all-night screening April 2. The series, starring Shintaro Katsu, tells the story of a shogun’s executioner who is forced into exile ...
Cinephiles who missed the various Akira Kurosawa centennial screenings and events last year can fill in the gaps of their knowledge during a retrospective at Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro March 21-April 2 (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com). The lineup includes the director’s acclaimed historical epics Seven Samurai (1954) and Red Beard (1965), as well as his ...
Fans of Taiwanese romantic comedies are in for a treat when the 2010 hit Au revoir Taipei (pictured) plays at Human Trust Cinema Yurakucho on March 12 (2-7-1 Yurakucho, Chiyoda-ku ; www.ttcg.jp). The action takes place in the course of a single day, depicting a young man who wants to buy a French textbook so ...
To commemorate the opening of the exhibition Vermeer: The Geographer and Flanders at the Bunkamura museum (2-24-1 Dogenzaka, Shibuya-ku; www.bunkamura.co.jp), the Vermeer biopic Girl with a Pearl Earring (2003; pictured) will be screening upstairs at Le Cinema. Colin Firth plays the Dutch painter and Scarlett Johansson is the peasant servant girl who becomes his assistant ...
Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com) is paying tribute to cinema maestro Fredrico Fellini, February 27-March 2. Among the films to be screened are 8½ (1963; pictured), a semi-autobiographical story of a filmmaker suffering from “director’s block” that is often considered Fellini’s definitive work, and Spirits of the Dead (1968), a horror trilogy ...
Certified Copy, the latest film by veteran Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami, will screen at Shibuya’s Eurospace (1-5 Maruyamacho, Shibuya-ku; www.eurospace.co.jp) from February 19. The Tuscany-set movie (pictured) tells the story of an antiques dealer and her relationship with an expert in art forgeries. They are played by Juliette Binoche, who picked up the best actress ...
Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com) will honor director Sion Sono at an all-night event on February 19. The maverick filmmaker will field questions from the audience prior to a screening of Noriko’s Dinner Table (2005) and his four hour-plus Love Exposure (2008; pictured). Shin-Bungeiza will also be running a selection of films ...
The Chinese drama Apart Together (2010; pictured) is screening at Bunkamura’s Le Cinema (2-24-1 Dogenzaka, Shibuya-ku; www.bunkamura.co.jp) from February 5. The movie depicts a man who travels from Taiwan to his native Shanghai, which he fled during WWII, leaving behind a pregnant wife. He’s determined to bring her back with him—except that she’s now remarried ...
Fans of European cinema will want to check out Soul Kitchen (2009; pictured), the latest film by Turkish-German director Fatih Akin, currently playing at Shibuya’s Cinema Rize (13-17 Utagawacho, Shibuya-ku; www.cinemarise.com). The movie tells the story of a Greek restaurant in Hamburg whose new chef spices up the lives of the regular customers by turning ...
Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com) will run an all-night marathon of films by critically acclaimed Portuguese director Pedro Costa, who is known for naturalistic works set on the fringes of Lisbon society. Included in the lineup is Costa’s latest film, Change Nothing (2009; pictured), a documentary about French actress Jeanne Balibar. Martial ...
A documentary on the corporatization of the American food industry, Food, Inc. (2008; pictured), will screen from January 22 at Shibuya’s Image Forum (2-10-2 Shibuya, Shibuya-ku; www.imageforum.co.jp). The thought-provoking study is the first in a series of films on social problems relating to food—a topic very much in the news as Japan struggles to increase ...
Le mari de la coiffeuse (The Hairdresser’s Husband), by prolific French director Patrice Leconte, will screen from January 8 at Shibuya’s Eurospace (1-5 Maruyamacho, Shibuya-ku; www.eurospace.co.jp). The 1990 film (pictured) tells the story of a 12-year-old boy who nurtures a crush on the local hairdresser until his parents bring an end to it. As an ...
A series celebrating the maestros of Italian cinema kicks off at Shibuya’s Image Forum on Christmas Day (2-10-2 Shibuya, Shibuya-ku; www.imageforum.co.jp). The first program, running through February 5, includes Bernardo Bertolucci’s crime drama The Conformist (1970; pictured), Federico Fellini’s paean to childhood memory, The Clowns (1970), and Roberto Rossellini’s political thriller General della Rovere (1959). ...
Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com) will pay tribute to Showa-era screen star Ryo Ikebe, December 22-31. Ikebe, who passed away in October at the age of 82, was known for his rugged good looks and his everyman roles in films such as Modern People (1952; pictured) and Snow Country (1957). Giuseppe Tornatore, ...
Bunkamura’s Le Cinema (2-24-1 Dogenzaka, Shibuya-ku; www.bunkamura.co.jp) will screen three films by English filmmaker Ken Loach, December 11-24. Loach is known for dark, social realist films like Sweet Sixteen (2002), about a Scottish teenager hoping to start life afresh as his birthday approaches, and It’s a Free World…(2007; pictured), in which a working class woman ...
Get your cult-cinema fix at a celebration of Cinema Novo, the movement which revolutionized Brazilian film in the ’60s and ’70s. Taking place December 4-17 at Shibuya’s Image Forum (2-10-2 Shibuya, Shibuya-ku; www.imageforum.co.jp), the program includes the digitally remastered Macunaíma (1969; pictured), a modern-day parable of a full-grown man born to an old woman deep ...
Fans of whimsical film will delight in French director François Ozon’s Ricky (2009; pictured), screening from November 27 at Bunkamura’s Le Cinema (2-24-1 Dogenzaka, Shibuya-ku; www.bunkamura.co.jp). The magic realist comedy tells the story of a single mother struggling to raise her daughter in the suburbs of Paris. After she and her new boyfriend have a ...
Fans of European film had cause for excitement when Catherine Deneuve, the doyenne of French cinema, visited Tokyo for the second time this year. The 67-year-old actress participated in the Femmes@Tokyo symposium in February, but she was back again last month to attend the 23rd Tokyo International Film Festival, where she unveiled her latest film, ...
Fans of classic Japanese cinema will want to catch the latest in the “Showa Heroine” series at Laputa in Asagaya (2-12-21 Asagaya-Kita, Suginami-ku; www.laputa-jp.com/laputa). The retrospective of films starring Yoko Minamida, running through December 30, includes a documentary about the final days of the actress, who succumbed to Alzheimer’s disease last year. Also to be ...
The 1st Tokyo Food Lovers Film Festival will be held at Ebisu Garden Cinema (4-20-2 Ebisu, Shibuya-ku; www.kadokawa-gardencinema.jp/yebisu), November 6-12. The program kicks off with Eatrip (2009; pictured), a documentary on contemporary Japanese food culture, which is screening with English subtitles. Other films include the ramen drama Tampopo (1985), The Scent of Green Papaya (1993) ...
Waseda Shochiku (1-5-16 Takadanobaba, Shinjuku-ku; www.wasedashochiku.co.jp) will pay tribute to pioneering Japanese animator Satoshi Kon, who died of pancreatic cancer in August at age 46. Kon’s work was highly influential both in Japan and abroad—Darren Aronofsky paid homage to the director’s Perfect Blue in his Requiem for a Dream, and Christopher Nolan’s hit Inception has ...
The quirky Argentinian comedy-drama Luisa (2009; pictured) is screening at Shibuya’s Eurospace (1-5 Maruyamacho, Shibuya-ku; www.eurospace.co.jp) from October 16. The film tells the story of a lonely 60-year-old widow in Buenos Aires who lives by a very strict routine—until her life is turned upside-down when her beloved cat dies and she loses her job on ...
The French-Korean coproduction A Brand New Life (2009; pictured) is coming to Iwanami Hall (2-1 Kanda-Jimbocho, Chiyoda-ku; www.iwanami-hall.com) from October 9. Directed in a slow, contemplative style, the film is largely based on director Ounie Lecomte’s own childhood. It tells the story of a girl who is sent to an orphanage in ’70s Seoul before ...
Two recent masterpieces of contemporary Korean cinema will be screened at Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com), October 9-12. Breathless (2009; pictured), the directorial debut of Yang Ik-Joon, tells the story of a bitter and violent debt collector who changes his ways after forming an unlikely friendship with a female high school student. ...
A retrospective of the eternal rebel of Japanese cinema, Nagisa Oshima, will screen September 30-October 8 at Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com). Highlights include Cruel Story of Youth (1960), a movie about teenage rebellion in a style influenced by the French New Wave, and the highly controversial In the Realm of the ...
Believe it or not, the biannual Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival is one of the most prestigious in the world. If you can’t make the trip to northern Japan, the best of the fest is coming to Tokyo’s Eurospace (1-5 Maruyamacho, Shibuya-ku; www.eurospace.co.jp) and Pole Pole (4-4-1 Higashi-Nakano, Nakano-ku; www.mmjp.or.jp/pole2) from September 18-October 22. Most ...
World music fans will want to hit up Shibuya’s Image Forum (2-10-2 Shibuya, Shibuya-ku; www.imageforum.co.jp) for the inspiring documentary Benda Bilili! (2010; pictured). Directors Renaud Barret and Florent de La Tullaye spent five years filming Staff Benda Bilili, a group of street musicians, handicapped by childhood bouts of polio, who ride through the slums of ...
Shibuya’s Cinema Vera (1-5 Maruyamacho, Shibuya-ku; www.cinemavera.com) is opening its vaults to show a collection of masterpieces from the history of cinema, September 4-October 1. The lineup includes works that will be familiar to any student who has sat through film 101 class, namely Citizen Kane (1941; pictured) and Battleship Potemkin (1925), as well as ...
Fans of European horror films should head to Shinjuku Musashino-kan (3-27-10 Shinjuku; http://shinjuku.musashino-k.jp) to catch Spirits of the Dead (1968; pictured), playing from August 28. The omnibus film sees directors Federico Fellini, Louis Malle and Roger Vadim (in Italian, French and English respectively) each try their hand at adapting a story by the master of ...
She hasn’t appeared in a film since 1973, but Brigitte Bardot’s blonde tresses and alluring pout are still inextricably linked with classic French cinema. From August 28 through September 28—the actress’ 74th birthday—Shinjuku theater Musashino-kan (3-27-10 Shinjuku; http://shinjuku.musashino-k.jp) pays tribute with screenings of five Bardot films from her heyday in the ’50s. Highlights include …And ...
The Argentinean crime thriller The Secret in Their Eyes (pictured), which picked up an Oscar for best foreign language film at this year’s Academy Awards, will screen from August 14 at Toho Cinemas Chanter (1-2-21 Yurakucho, Chiyoda-ku; 03-3591-1511). The story, told through flashbacks, concerns a retired justice official writing a novel based on the case ...
Few artists rose from humbler origins than Séraphine Louis, a housemaid in rural France who used improvised materials to create paintings in her scant free time. Now, nearly 70 years after Louis’ death, prestigious museums display her vibrantly colored canvases. The biopic Séraphine (pictured), screening from August 7 at Iwanami Hall (2-1 Kanda-Jimbocho, Chiyoda-ku; www.iwanami-hall.com), ...
World cinema fans won’t want to miss The Chinese Film Retrospective 2010 at K’s Cinema in Shinjuku on August 27 (3-35-13 Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku; www.ks-cinema.com). Highlights include Beijing Bicycle (2001; pictured), about a poor boy from the countryside working as a messenger in Beijing until his bike is stolen, which won the Grand Jury Prize at ...
Fans of classic comedy have something to look forward to as Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com) hosts an all-night marathon of films by French director Jacques Tati on July 31. Tati is known for his colorful visual comedies, including his signature film Mon Oncle (1958; pictured), in which the director plays a ...
Agatha Christie fans have something to look forward to on July 19 when the French film Le Grand Alibi (2008; pictured), based on the novel The Hollow, comes to Bunkamura’s Le Cinema (2-24-1 Dogenzaka, Shibuya-ku; www.bunkamura.co.jp). In the past, the estate of the famed mystery writer only allowed film adaptations that were set in England ...
The Swedish horror flick Let the Right One In (2008; pictured) will screen at Ginza Theatre Cinema (1-11-2 Ginza, Chuo-ku; 03-3535-6000) from July 10. A successful reimagining of the vampire genre, the film focuses on a bullied 12-year-old boy and his budding friendship with the girl next door—who just happens to be a be a ...
The Shinjuku Musashinokan theater (3-27-10 Shinjuku; http://shinjuku.musashino-k.jp) celebrates the renaissance of Hollywood cinema in the ’60s-’70s with a series of “Ziggy Films.” Screening from July 3 is Brewster McCloud (1970; pictured), a rarely seen Robert Altman oddity about a young man hiding out in the Houston Astrodome while building a flying machine. That’s followed by ...
Veteran Italian director Pupi Avati’s drama Giovanna’s Father (2008; pictured) will screen at Shibuya’s Eurospace (1-5 Maruyamacho, Shibuya-ku; www.eurospace.co.jp) and Ginza Cine Patos (4-8-7 Ginza, Chuo-ku; www.humax-cinema.co.jp) from June 26. Set in Avati’s native Bologna in the years before and after WWII, and shot in a style evocative of aged family photographs, the film tells ...
From June 19-July 16, the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography in Ebisu (1-13-3 Mita, Meguro-ku; www.syabi.com) will present a pair of documentaries on the Vietnam War. Hearts and Minds won the 1974 Academy Award for best doc and inspired the career of Michael Moore, who said it is “not only the best documentary I have ...
On June 19, Ikebukuro cinema Shin-Bungeiza (1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro, Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com) will hold an all-night screening of Female Convict 701 films (1972-73; pictured). The series, based on a manga by Toru Shinohara, follows the adventures of Nami “the Scorpion” Matsushima, a yakuza moll who lands in prison after stabbing her double-crossing lover. The 1972 debut was ...
Waseda Shochiku cinema (1-5-16 Takadanobaba, Shinjuku-ku; www.wasedashochiku.co.jp) is screening a double feature of early Takeshi Kitano films from June 5-11. In Sonatine (1993; pictured), Kitano plays a Tokyo yakuza who is sent to Okinawa to settle a feud between rival factions, and ends up wondering what his life is all about. Kids Return (1996), the ...
The Bakuon Film Festival (www.bakuon-bb.net/2010) has a simple concept: play loud movies at explosive volumes. Running through June 12 at Kichijoji’s Baus Theater (042-22-3555; www.baustheater.com), the program includes Control (2007; pictured), Anton Corbijin’s film about influential English band Joy Division; Sogo Ishii’s punk fantasy Burst City (1982); and War of the Worlds (2005). BYO earplugs… ...
The Oscar-nominated documentary Burma VJ (2008; pictured) is now screening at Shibuya’s Image Forum (2-10-2 Shibuya; www.imageforum.co.jp). Directed by Anders Østergaard, the film documents the 2007 demonstrations against military rule in Myanmar, during which Japanese photographer Kenji Nagai was killed. Due to strict censorship, footage was shot by underground reporters known as “video journalists,” or ...
Asagaya theater Laputa (2-12-21 Asagaya-kita, Suginami-ku; www.laputa-jp.com) is hosting the Laputa Animation Festival 2010 through June 5. The program includes lesser-known animated features and shorts from Europe, all shown with Japanese subtitles. Entries range from a selection of shorts by German animator Gil Alkabetz (like 2007’s The Sunny Day, pictured) to the latest in experimental ...
Takadanobaba cinema Waseda Shochiku (1-5-16 Takadanobaba; www.wasedashochiku.co.jp) will screen four films by late Polish director Krzysztof Kieślowski from May 15-28. The Double Life of Véronique (1991; pictured) is a creepy tale of two nearly identical women leading parallel lives in Krakow and Paris. The films in The Three Colors Trilogy (1993-1994) are loosely based on ...
Asagaya’s Laputa cinema (03-3336-5440; www.laputa-jp.com) is running a retrospective of Kyoko Kishida films through June 13. The prolific actress debuted in 1958 and continued acting until her death in 2006. Highlights include Woman in the Dunes (1964; pictured), in which she plays a mysterious figure who lives in the desert and kidnaps an entomologist, and ...
Shibuya’s Cinema Rise (03-3464-0051; www.cinemarise.com) is running a retrospective of films that surprised the world, changed history, or created a new genre. Through April 30, Jim Jarmusch’s episodic Coffee & Cigarettes (2003) gets a look, along with two films that reinvented the musical: Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001) and 8 Femmes (2002; pictured). Hong ...
The Russian-French coproduction Le Concert (2009) will screen from April 17 at Shibuya’s Le Cinema (03-3477-9111 www.bunkamura.co.jp) and Ginza’s Cine Switch (03-3561-0707 www.cineswitch.com). The film tells the fictional story of a renowned conductor of the Bolshoi orchestra who is blacklisted for political reasons by the communist government before staging his musical comeback in Paris Critical ...
Through April 30, Brillia Short Shorts Theater in Yokohama (www.brillia-sst.jp; 045-633-2151) is showing a collection of four films about chance meetings. One highlight is Morgenschwarm (“Morning Flirt,” 2005; pictured), which tells the story of a German businessman whose life is turned upside-down when a beautiful woman disturbs his morning commuting ritual. Also on the program ...
There’s been a spate of films about fashion designer Coco Chanel recently, with both Audrey Tautou and Shirley MacLaine taking turns portraying the originator of the “Little Black Dress.” Film buffs up for yet another biopic can go to Ikebukuro cinema Shin-Bungeiza (03-3971-9422; www.shin-bungeiza.com) to catch Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky (2009; pictured) from April ...
Classical music fans have a lot to look forward to as a series of opera films come to the big screen this season. Io, Don Giovanni (2009; pictured), the story of Mozart’s collaboration with lyricist Lorenzo da Ponte, will play at Shibuya’s Le Cinema (03-3477-9111 www.bunkamura.co.jp) from April 10. Meanwhile, select Shochiku cinemas nationwide continue ...
With Bob Dylan’s upcoming Tokyo shows sold out, those not lucky enough to get a ticket can console themselves by heading over to Shibuya’s Image Forum (03-5766-0114; www.imageforum.co.jp) to check out a trio of Dylan docs, running till April 9. D.A. Pennebaker’s Don’t Look Back (1967) features Dylan struggling with his own fame during a ...
To mark the release of Tim Burton’s highly anticipated Alice in Wonderland, the Shin-Bungeiza theater in Ikebukuro is holding an all-night screening of fantasy films on March 20, from 10pm, including Terry Gilliam’s Tideland (2005; pictured) and Czech animator Jan Svankmajer’s Alice (1988). After over eight hours of viewing, you may feel as if you’ve ...
Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia 2012