Teruo Ishii Fan Club

A documentary on Teruo Ishii, the Japanese "King of Cult".

Mikio Naruse 100th Birth Anniversary

Because his style was similar to that of Yasujiro Ozu, who was already active at Shochiku, he moved to PCL (currently Toho) in 1933, where he appeared in the talkie works "My Wife, Like a Rose" and "Tsuruhachi Tsurujiro." It got attention. There were times when he was unable to make as many films as he wanted due to wartime film regulations and post-war Toho disputes, but in 1951 he revived his career with Meshi. Since then, he has released masterpieces one after another, including "Okaasan," "Lightning," "The Couple," "Wife," "Anii Mouto," "Sounds of the Mountain," and "Bangiku." The pinnacle of his work, "Floating Clouds," is Kenji Mizoguchi's "Wife." Even director Ozu was impressed, calling it a masterpiece of Japanese cinema, on par with "The Sisters of Gion." He depicted ordinary people in everyday life with an everyday realism that was not influenced by lyricism, and he consistently sought out women as his subjects.

A. K.

An intimate chronicle of the shooting of Ran (1985), a film directed by the legendary Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa.

Seijun Suzuki: kabuki & yakuzas

Film director and screenwriter Seijun Suzuki (1923-2017), who in the sixties was the great innovator of Japanese cinema; and his collaborator, art director and screenwriter Takeo Kimura (1918-2010), recall how they made their great masterpieces about the Yakuza underworld for the Nikkatsu film company.

Ken San

KEN SAN pieces together the puzzle of the life and legacy of Japan's mythical acting icon, Ken Takakura. Collaborators, friends and family tell intimate stories of Ken's journey: how one man of quiet dignity became a cultural barrier-breaking film star.

Bâtons d'encens pour Mizoguchi

By Player

The film is a series of vignettes from Taiji Tonoyama's life and film clips, interspersed with a dialogue to camera by Nobuko Otowa, addressing the camera as if she is addressing Tonoyama himself, recollecting events in his life. The film focuses on Tonoyama's alcohol dependence and his various sexual relationships, as well as his film work with Shindo.

Nezumikozo Jirokichi

Legendary anime director Rintaro’s (Metropolis, X/1999, Galaxy Express 999) first new work in over a decade depicts pioneering 1930s director Sadao Yamanaka and the production of his Nezumikozo Jirokichi. Despite dying before the age of 30, Yamanaka was a pivotal influence in Japanese cinema whose work would go on to inspire future generations. While most of his films have been lost to time, his scripts remain, and Nezumikozo Jirokichi recreates one of these lost films—a tale of a famous, virtuous bandit in old Edo—as imagined by Rintaro together with an all-star team including Katsuhiro Otomo (Akira, Memories), Taro Maki (Pluto, Millennium Actress) and Masao Maruyama (Ninja Scroll, Perfect Blue).

Red Shade

Keichi Tanaamis new animation work Red Shade (2021) is based on paintings that he had produced on the premise that they will be set in motion. Each of the 80 selected scenes was given a distinct movement of its own, and the edited version of the completed work became the first film. The 80 scenes are each independently complete, and can be freely rearranged. For example, you can start from scent 80 and end in scene one, or arrange them irregularly like 1, 4, 8, 7, and so on. In other words, the essence of the work does not change no matter how the scenes are arranged. Even so, it is possible to produce a strong impact by exchanging the images for each frame, and one can also for instance, create an impression of a refreshing breeze sweeping through the green meadows.

Kinokinokino

What was cinema in the past? What is cinema today? Hamburg filmmaker Dennis Albrecht asked himself these questions as he sifted through material he had been collecting since a project idea in 2008. Since then, he has repeatedly taken cameras into cinemas that no longer exist. He shot commercials, short films or events at the Grindel-Kino, Streit's, Rialto and Savoy and many other Hamburg movie theaters. In these personal perspectives, we see many cultural places that have disappeared.

Soldier’s Fortune

Documentary about the first German foreign deployment of German soldiers in Kosovo since the Second World War in 1995.

Mangas, une révolution française

2021 served as a revelation for the last holdouts: thanks to confinement and the “Culture Pass”, manga sales and streaming anime viewing hours have exploded. These are today the dominant cultural works among young people. In truth, the trend has already been present for at least ten years. However, not so long ago, criticisms were rife and politicians accused manga of all evils. For the first time, precursors and current generations, cartoonists and publishers, absolute fans and rappers speak about their passion for these comics from Japan.

Picturing Elizabeth: Her Life in Images

Sophie Raworth explores the stories behind some of the most famous and era-defining pictures of the Queen, and shows how they chart our changing relationship with the monarchy.

Elizabeth: Fashioning a Monarch

In this special tribute Fiona Bruce looks at how, across the decades, The Queen used her wardrobe to fashion a style that came to perfectly reflect her dedication to duty.

Viejo Hotel Ostende

Mariano Llinás makes, at the request of the Viejo Hotel Ostende, a portrait of the Hotel's future over its 110 years of history

A Tribute to HRH Duke of Edinburgh

The remarkable life story of HRH the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Philip, the man who stood beside the Queen for over 70 years. Featuring interviews with those who knew him best.

Les sentiers culturels

On sourira de nous

Four friends tired of protests are thinking about another way to shake up capitalist society. Driven by fiction, they decide to blow up a Brussels shopping center. How to think the attack? What roles do they need to play in order to imagine taking action? Is their friendship reconcilable with such a radical act?

5 Seasons of Revolution

Lina’s plan was simple. She wanted to become a camerawoman. She liked filming details of life and people around her, mainly during a bright sunny day in Damascus. But with the uprising in Syria, Lina was slowly absorbed into documenting the impact on people’s lives. It didn’t take long before events escalated, and arrests, torture, and potentially life-threatening situations became a reality for Lina to negotiate on a daily basis. She had to adapt. She invented personas and aliases. They each helped her navigate life under a new norm. What was a simple plan, turned into a complex web of identities, which seemed then a small price in exchange for her liberty to continue to hold the camera.

L.A.P.A.

Documentary about the world of hip hop and the daily life of those who seek to survive from music in Brazil, all set in the traditional neighborhood of Lapa Carioca.