Japanese Film Festival 2025

A SAMURAI IN TIME
Dir. Junichi Yasuda
(2024 / 131 min)

 At the end of the Edo period in Kyoto, during a stormy night a samurai prepares to fight against a ronin, when a flash of lighting hits and when he wakes up to find himself in a different time. He has been transported through time to the present day and the location where he was about to duel is now a film set for jidaigeki TV shows and movies. Still in his samurai clothes he is mistaken for an extra and immediately thrust into the world of jidaigeki productions. Due to his very ‘authentic’ look and speech, he starts working on many productions and finds himself playing the role of a “kirareyaku”, a swordsman whose job is to die spectacularly on film.

AKIRA
Dir. Katsuhiro Otomo
(1988 / 124 min)

July, 1988— World War III breaks loose. Then, in 2019, in megalopolis Tokyo… As the leader of a group of young robust delinquents, Kaneda spent his nights tearing through the urban wastes, racing his motorbike against rival groups. One night while riding with his gang, his friend Tetsuo suddenly encounters a strange boy― the product of human experimentation— and is injured in the ensuing crash. Shortly thereafter, a military squadron appears to take the boy and Tetsuo away to an army research facility. Determined to free Tetsuo from capture, Kaneda sneaks into the army research lab. However, a regimen of extreme experimental procedures has awakened a new power in his friend, and now he is consumed by madness.

Good Morning
Dir. Yasujiro Ozu
(1959/ 93 min)

Several families live alongside each other in rows of small houses in a residential area on the outskirts of Tokyo. One of them is home to the Hayashi family, comprised of office worker Keitaro, his wife Tamiko, her younger sister Setsuko, and their elementary school age sons Minoru and Isamu. The boys pester their parents to buy a television but to no avail, so they spend all their free time with the other neighborhood children ensconced in the home of a young couple with the only television on the block. Meanwhile, breaking wind becomes a fad among the local kids, and they pour their energies into trying different methods of producing flatulent sounds on command. Meanwhile, a minor dispute breaks out among the local housewives over fees for the local women’s association. Tamiko admonishes Minoru and Isamu for persistently pleading for a television, and Keitaro angrily scolds them for saying unnecessary things. The children retort that adults say needless things too, such as “Good day,” “Good morning,” and “Nice weather we’re having.” Then they implement a new strategy: a vow of silence…

The Mourning Forest
Director: Naomi Kawase
(2007/ 97 min)

Elder Shigeki lives in a retirement home where he is lovingly cared for by Nurse Machiko, who is grieving the loss of a child. After celebrating Shigeki’s birthday, the two take a trip to the countryside. The man, followed by Machiko, goes into the forest and, after two days of walking made difficult by the dense vegetation, they reach the place where Shigeki’s wife is buried. Machiko learns that the man has been writing to his wife for 33 years, and is now preparing to write her the last letter.