July 10–21, 2024 · Japan Society · New York, NY
North America's largest Japanese film festival presents two weeks of contemporary premieres, including new films from Kei Chika-ura, Takeshi Kitano, Gakuryu Ishii, Shunji Iwai, Sho Miyake and Shinya Tsukamoto
31 films including 5 International Premieres, 10 North American Premieres, 4 U.S. Premieres, 2 East Coast Premieres and 7 New York Premieres
Includes the International Premiere of SHIN GODZILLA: ORTHOchromatic
SHIN GODZILLA: ORTHOchromatic © 2016,2023 TOHO CO., LTD
New York, NY (June 4, 2024)—Japan Society announces the full lineup of the 17th annual JAPAN CUTS: Festival of New Japanese Film, the largest festival of its kind in North America. Set for July 10–August 21 in New York City, this year's edition will present over 30 films spanning 12 days across Feature Slate, Next Generation, Classics and Short Film sections. Among the festival's lineup are five International Premieres, 10 North American Premieres, four U.S. Premieres, two East Coast Premieres and seven New York Premieres. Additionally, JAPAN CUTS will welcome over eight actors and directors as special guests and host three parties.
“We couldn't be more amazed by this year's festival,” says Peter Tatara, Director of Film at Japan Society, who organized this year's festival with Japan Society Film Programmer Alexander Fee. “This year's JAPAN CUTS presents an abundance of powerful, engaging and unexpected films together with rare appearances from some of their most imaginative creators. JAPAN CUTS is a reflection of the breadth of Japan's contemporary film industry, and this year absolutely celebrates the scope and storytelling of what Japanese cinema brings to the world.”
Starting off this year's festival, JAPAN CUTS is honored to present the North American Premiere of Between the White Key and the Black Key as its Opening Film. Starring Sosuke Ikematsu and with director Masanori Tominaga appearing as a special guest, JAPAN CUTS will begin with a jazzy ode to 1980s Ginza as free flowing and ingenious as jazz itself.
Leading this year's guests, JAPAN CUTS will present acclaimed actor Mirai Moriyama with this year's CUT ABOVE Award for Outstanding Achievement in Film and acting legend Tatsuya Fuji with a Lifetime Achievement Award.
Moriyama will receive the CUT ABOVE Award for his role in this year's Centerpiece Film, Shadow of Fire from director Shinya Tsukamoto. Both Moriyama and Tsukamoto will make special appearances at the film's premiere. Moriyama is a multi-hyphenate screen actor, stage actor and dancer known for a remarkably broad body of work despite his young age, and Shinya Tsukamoto's Shadow of Fire pushes him to his limit in a brutal story about a war orphan in the ruins of World War II.
Fuji will be presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award following the New York Premiere of Kei Chika-ura's Great Absence, with both Fuji and Chika-ura attending in person. Fuji is Japanese acting royalty with a career spanning 60 years, including Nagisa Oshima's In the Realm of the Senses. Great Absence brings one of Japan's greatest actors together with one of its rising directors for a powerful look at memory, family and loss. The film further co-stars CUT ABOVE winner Mirai Moriyama.
Further special guests include iconoclastic director Gakuryu Ishii, appearing for the East Coast Premiere of The Box Man as well as a retrospective screening of August in the Water; director Noriko Yuasa will appear at the International Premiere of Performing KAORU's Funeral, winner of the JAPAN CUTS Award at the 2024 Osaka Asian Film Festival; and actress Tomoko Tabata will appear at a restoration premiere of Shinji Somai's undisputed masterpiece Moving.
Additional highlights of this year's festival:
- Next Generation competition with a hand-picked selection of independent narrative features directed by emerging directors. The festival's only juried section, Japan Society awards the Obayashi Prize to its most accomplished film as determined by a jury of industry professionals. This year's distinguished jurors are Edo Choi, programmer at the Museum of the Moving Image; Matt Schley, film journalist and critic; and Ariel Esteban Cayer, writer, programmer and distributor (Kani Releasing).
- SHORT CUTS which explores experimental, narrative and animated short-length films, including Nezumikozo Jirokichi, celebrating silent era director Sadao Yamanaka and created by a team of anime legends including Rintaro and Katsuhiro Otomo, and Bottle George, a stop-motion short from the mind of Akihiro Nishino.
- Classics with three canonical works of '80s and '90s independent cinema. Following Japan Society's recent retrospective on revered filmmaker Shinji Somai and his first-ever North American focus, Japan Society presents the East Coast premiere of the 4K restoration of Somai's masterpiece Moving with lead actress Tomoko Tabata in attendance. Gakuryu Ishii (formerly Sogo Ishii), another singular independent auteur of the 1980s, will present an incredibly rare imported 35mm presentation of his 1995 cult sci-fi fantasy August in the Water —considered long out of circulation and distribution. Lastly, Toshiharu Ikeda's elemental Mermaid Legend, an ecological vengeance thriller, screens for its 40th Anniversary.
- Pop culture hits including the International Premiere of SHIN GODZILLA: ORTHOchromatic, a black-and-white rendition of Hideaki Anno and Shinji Higuchi‘s Godzilla masterpiece; KUBI from Takeshi Kitano, an irreverent historical bloodbath from one of Japan's most notorious creators; and two secret anime screenings to be announced closer to the festival.
Described by The New York Times as “meticulously curated” and “an annual highlight of New York's film calendar,” JAPAN CUTS brings the best and hardest-to-find contemporary films from Japan to New York City. From blockbusters, independent productions and anime, to documentaries, avant-garde works and short films, JAPAN CUTS offers an impressive look at the past 12 months of Japanese cinema. Japan Society is a 117-year-old nonprofit organization focused on connecting the U.S. and Japan, and its JAPAN CUTS is one of the organization's largest and most popular programs.
All films will be screened at Japan Society (333 East 47th St., New York, NY 10017) and presented in Japanese with English subtitles unless otherwise noted.
JAPAN CUTS 2024 OPENING, CENTERPIECE & LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT FILMS
Opening Film
Between the White Key and the Black Key (North American Premiere)
『 白鍵と黒鍵の間に』(Hakken to Kokken no Aida ni)
Wednesday, July 10 at 6:30 PM – With Director Q&A and Reception
Dir. Masanori Tominaga, 2023, 94 min., DCP, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Sosuke Ikematsu, Riisa Naka, Go Morita, Crystal Kay.
Opening Night Film with Director Masanori Tominaga Q&A and Reception. Music sweeps through 1980s Ginza, a glamorous and dangerous neighborhood where well heeled Tokyoites, artists and thugs all sway together under the power of jazz. Sosuke Ikematsu stars in this spiraling, splintering, intersecting Mobius strip of a film based on the memoirs of jazz pianist Hiroshi Minami and a single night and a forbidden song that changes destiny. Also featuring Japanese pop star Crystal Kay.
Centerpiece Film
Shadow of Fire (U.S. Premiere)
『ほかげ』(Hokage)
Wednesday, July 17 at 6:30 PM – With Award Presentation, Q&A, and Reception
Dir. Shinya Tsukamoto, 2023, 95 min., DCP, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. Shuri, Mirai Moriyama, Oga Tsukao, Hiroki Kono.
The sickness of postwar Japan runs at a fever pitch in Shinya Tsukamoto's (Tetsuo the Iron Man, Bullet Ballet) latest entry to his war trilogy, following his acclaimed wartime dramas Fires on the Plain and Killing (JC 2019). A chamber drama that evolves beyond its initial setup, Shadow of Fire opens with the chance rendezvous of two survivors—an orphan child who steals food from the black market (Oga Tsukao) and a woman forced to sell her body (Shuri) in the ruins of a burnt-out tavern. The introduction of a young soldier still tormented by the war and a mysterious stranger (played by 2024 CUT ABOVE Award recipient Mirai Moriyama) bring new complications to the pair's impermanent way of life. An unflinching examination of the immediate postwar chaos, Tsukamoto's masterful direction once again offers a brutally searing critique of war as Shadow of Fire portrays a populace fashioned into specters, unable to reckon with the trauma of the past. Followed by Mirai Moriyama CUT ABOVE Award presentation, Q&A with Shinya Tsukamoto and Mirai Moriyama, and Reception.
Lifetime Achievement Award
Great Absence (New York Premiere)
『 大いなる不在』 (Oinaru Fuzai)
Thursday, July 18 at 6:30 PM – With Award Presentation, Q&A, and Reception
Dir. Kei Chika-ura, 2023, 133 min., DCP, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Tatsuya Fuji, Mirai Moriyama, Yoko Maki, Hideko Hara.Tokyo-based actor Takashi (Mirai Moriyama) reluctantly travels to northern Kyushu with his wife (Yoko Maki) after local police inform him of a distress call made by his estranged father Yohji (Tatsuya Fuji), a retired professor who shows signs of rapidly progressive dementia. Once there, Takashi becomes involved in a mystery concerning the disappearance of Naomi (Hideko Hara), the woman for whom Yohji abandoned his family 20 years ago. Did she really commit suicide as Yohji claims? A deeply moving and artfully multi-layered sophomore feature about reconciliation, love and mortality by director Kei Chika-ura (Complicity) featuring stellar cinematography by frequent Hirokazu Kore-eda collaborator Yutaka Yamazaki. Followed by Lifetime Achievement Award Presentation for Tatsuya Fuji, Q&A with K
