The Opening Ceremony for the Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia 2022 was held at LINE CUBE SHIBUYA on June 7th (Tue). 9 awards were presented at the ceremony. U-25 Program, Shibuya Diversity Award, Biogen Award, BOOK SHORTS Award, Amuse Musical Short Film Pitch Competition, MILBON BEAUTY AWARD, Save the Earth! Minister's Award, the Ministry of the Environment & J-WAVE Award, and Global Spotlight Award.
SSFF & ASIA received 5720 entries for the competitions including Official Competition supported by Sony from 126 countries & regions. The judges will select best short awards of each category: International, Asia International, Japan, Non-Fiction, and Animation among about 200 finalists. Grand-Prix is selected from winners of the Academy Awards Accredited 5 Competitions. Each winner will be eligible to the Oscar of the short film category next year and will be announced on June 20th at Meiji-Jingu Kaikan in Tokyo. SSFF & ASIA 2022 has begun its screening from today till June 20th at Tokyo as well as Online Venue. Some of the films including award-winnings will be available at the Online Venue till June 30th.
About the Awards
The presenter for the U-25 Project, actress Hitomi Kuroki, who also directed a short film and was nominated for the Japan Competition this year, showed great admiration towards the U-25 Project and praised the best award winning “Final Deathtination,” saying “this work is unique to U-25: it has the speed and a balance humor & sentiment.” Mr. Hasebe, Mayer of Shibuya Ward presented the Shibuya Diversity Award and praised the awardwinning short film “Room without Sound” as it describes the point of view of dis-abled persons. He also told how Shibuya has been working on diversity as well as a 5G project which will make connect people with each other.
For the Musical Short Film Pitch Competition, Manabu Yamauchi of Amuse, inc. and actress Reon Yuzuki were the presenters and they talked about “The Sweet Impulse,” the winner of the award, and how it conveys all the genres of music with a strong storyline. Ms. Yuzuki also commented from an actor's perspective and how musicals are a great way to exercise such skills. Nicolas Johns (President & Representative Director, Biogen Japan）introduced the story of the awardwinning short film “Barefoot Empress.” This documentary conveys our message, “Make Impossible Possible,” in a powerful way. For the MILBON BEAUTY AWARD, the presenter Ryuji Sato (Chairman/President/CEO at Milbon Co Ltd.) described the award winning short “The Hands,” as it lets the audience catch a glimpse of something beautiful within their everyday life.
The Ministry of the Environment talked about an urgent issue: the climate change crisis and the awardwinning short film, “Penthouse,” conveyed the message very well. Morio Nakaoka (President, J-WAVE) praised the award-winning short film “Present for Future,” as it inspires our brain and makes us think of the problem critically and creatively.
Our 24th film festival, with the theme “Meta Cinema,” the president of the film festival, Tetsuya Bessho, arrived at the festival digitally and spoke on the other programs that include AI technology, smartphones, and a world that exceeds “normal” theater experience.
Our ambassador LiLiCo was at the red carpet special studio interviewing guests. At the end of the ceremony she made a wonderful remark on the short film industry saying how exciting short films can be. The Opening Ceremony Archived Movie is available with English translation at YouTube: https://youtu.be/AsOWxkTW49Y
In honor of Actors Short Film 2, a program for actor to challenge themselves as directors, the nominees for the Japan Program, Sho Aoyagi, Tina Tamashiro, Yudai Chiba, Eita Nagayama, and Atsuko Maeda came and spoke at the Opening Ceremony about their process of directing. Ms. Tamashiro who also wrote the screenplay of “STORY”, wanted to focus on person-to-person connections. The pandemic made her think more about how to express her feelings with others has changed. Mr. Nagayama who worked with Koji Yakusho talked about how he offered the role to him by sending the script and explained how he wanted to take something that was authentic to the situation. Ms. Maeda explained how she found the differences between directing and acting.
List of Award Winners
★U-25Project Best Short Award 『Final Deathtination』
Director：Marika Tamura/2:05 / Japan / Animation / 2021
A suicidal man encounters “Death” who is a “travel agent” to find the best place to die.
★The 8th BOOK SHORTS Award
The One I want to meet」
Writer：Moe Haruno
★Musical Short Film Pitch Competition（Amuse） 『The Sweet Impulse』
Ka-ki WONG / Co-director, writer, editor/ TANG Yi / Co-director, singer, composer
Human drama about a journalist who has special ability that she can see the chef's thoughts once she eats the
food and a pâtissier.
★MILBON BEAUTY AWARD 『The Hands』
Director: Seowon JUNG / 9:40 /Korea / Drama / 2021
Sign language interpreter Doh-young learns of his wife's delivery for the newborn bay during his live interpretation for a case briefing. In his own way, Doh-young conveys his warm feelings towards his wife and the newborn child.
★Save the Earth！Minister's Award, the Ministry of the Environment（Penthouse）
監督：Vegard Dahle & Line Klungseth Johansen/ 19:37 / Norway / Drama / 2022
The world is uninhabitable and flooded, and everyone has fled. Except from John and his concerned boyfriend Benjamin. When Benjamin finds a radio and wants to flee, John's utopian dream of creating a self-sustained world starts falling apart. John embarks on a destructive mission to force them to stay together.
★Save the Earth！J-WAVE Award 『Present for Future』
Director：Shamir Raiapov /1:00 / Kyrgyzstan / Drama / 2021
Amanda is walking in the forest. She is enjoying the beauty of nature, listening to sounds of stream, jumping around. She finds a rabbit on her way and wants to hold him. Then suddenly…
★Global Spotlight Award 『Roborovski』
Director： Tilda Cobham-Hervey ＆ Dev Patel / 15:03 / Australia / Animation / 2020
Roborovski follows the eponymous thimble sized hamster, who spends his days in Marvin's Pet Shop, hoping to find a family. However, when he is constantly overlooked by the people and animals around him his seething resentment and intense jealousy soon takes hold and a murderous side of little Roborovski is released.
