This year’s Busan International Film Festival is the 24th in the series and it runs from October 03rd to the 12th. This is the first time that I have covered Busan but it has been on the cards for a while because, much like Tokyo and Osaka, it’s a good place to scout out Asian films. There is a great slate of titles from some soon-to-be-released mainstream films to indie movies and there are familiar titles featured at other festivals.
Here are the titles!
シスターフッド 「Shisuta-fuddo」
Release Date: March 01st, 2019
Duration: 88 mins.
Director: Takashi Nishihara
Writer: Takashi Nishihara (Screenplay),
Starring: BOMI, Manami Usamaru, Nina Endo, Ryo Iwase, Mika Akizuki
Inspired by the #MeToo movement and the salience of identity politics in current political discourse, director Takashi Nishihara, who I interviewed, has created this semi-fictional work which looks at the lives of young women in Tokyo. Here’s my review from the Osaka Asian Film Festival.
Synopsis: To capture the shifts going on in gender relations in Japan, Nishihara blurs the bounds between fiction and reality by merging footage from a documentary he has been shooting over the last few years and casting real life actors and models such as Nina Endo and Mika Akizuki, SUMIRE and Manami Usamaru, and the musician BOMI, and making them play fictional variations of themselves. Each gives a portrayal of a young woman going about their lives. We see them modelling, studying, performing concerts, each desiring to be treated fairly as they chase their dreams and question their role in society. These questions emerge thanks to a link character, a middle-aged male documentary film director named Ikeda, played by Ryo Iwase, who interviews people for a documentary about feminism.
静かな雨 「Shizukana Ame」
Release Date: 2020
Duration: 99 mins.
Director: Ryutaro Nakagawa
Writer: Eiji Umehara, Ryutaro Nakagawa (Screenplay), Natsu Miyashita (Novel)
Starring: Taiga Nakano, Misa Eto,
Ryutaro Nakagawa has been making films for a while now (I first wrote about him with a Kickstarter for Plastic Love Story) and each has been a quiet success on the festival circuit. He has two out this year and this one isn’t listed on IMDB.
Synopsis: Bio-archaeology sounds like hard thinking work and one bio-archaeology research assistant named Yukisuke (Taiga) often buys taiyaki (a fish-shaped pastry) at a taiyaki store near his university to power his brain. He is served by the owner, s young woman named Koyomi (Misa Eto) and the two build up a rapport as they begin to talk regularly but, one morning, Koyomi gets into a traffic accident and falls into a coma. Yukisuke continues to visit Koyomi at the hospital and, eventually, Koyomi regains consciousness, but she soon realises that she has problems with her memory. She remembers everything up to the accident, but her short term memory can’t remember anything beyond the present day.
カツベン！ 「Katsuben!」
Release Date: December 13th, 2019
Duration: 129 mins.
Director: Masayuki Suo
Writer: Shozo Katashima (Screenplay)
Starring: Ryo Narita, Yuina Kuroshima, Masatoshi Nagase, Kengo Kora, Mao Inoue, Naoto Takenaka, Eri Watanabe, Fumiyo Kohinata, Yutaka Takennouchi, Shoji Masui, Motoi Sasaki, Takao Tsuchimoto, Kazuhito Amano,
Synopsis: It is the era of the silent movies and benshi (narrators who appear live in the cinema) are in demand. Shuntaro lives in a small town and he has had dreams of becoming a benshi ever since he was a child and his dreams are about to come true just as (it gets better) he is also reunited with his first love. He is, however, tasked with pleasing tough crowds as well as doing the chores and he also gets involved in a police case where they are tracking thieves and political activists…
ある殺人、落葉のころに 「Aru satsujin, rakuyo no koro ni」
Release Date: N/A
Duration: 79 mins.
Director: Takuya Misawa
Writer: N/A
Starring: Koji Moriya, Haya Nakazaki, Yusaku Mori, Shugo Nagashima, Natsuko Hori, Ena Koshino, Chun Yip Lo, Toko Narushima,
Director Takuya Misawa was responsible for Chigasaki Story, and he’s back with a noir-like film.
Synopsis: Oiso is the seaside town where this film is set and the protagonists are Four young people, Tomoki, Shun, Kazuya, and Eita, who have been friends since their childhood but when Tomoki’s uncle, their former teacher, is found dead, their relationship is threatened as a hidden figure emerges along with the truth of the killing.
楽園 「Rakuen」
Release Date: October 18th, 2019
Duration: 129 mins.
Director: Takahisa Zeze
Writer: Takahisa Zeze (Screenplay) Shuichi Yoshida (Novel)
Starring: Gou Ayano, Hana Sugisaki, Koichi Sato, Nijiro Murakami, Reiko Kataoka, Asuka Kurosawa, Shizuka Ishibashi, Toshie Negishi, Akira Emoto,
This is based on the short stories “Aota Y Jiro” and “Yorozuya Zenjiro” by Shuichi Yoshida. His novels are popular for adaptations with Rage, The Ravine of Goodbye, The Story of Yonosuke, Villain, and Parade already getting the big screen treatment.
Synopsis: A little girl is kidnapped and the only witness, Tsumugi (Hana Sugisaki), is left traumatised. With the kidnapper never having been caught, paranoia runs high and it breaks out when, 12 years later, a girl goes missing along the same road. Takeshi (Gou Ayano) is a lonely young man who sells recyclable products with his mother and he is suspected of the kidnapping. Fearing the situation, he flees.
One year later, another man named Zenjiro (Koichi Sato) is accused. He lives with his pet dog near the road where the two kidnapping cases took place but is he guilty? Horrifying revelations soon emerge from the case…
Release Date: 2019
Duration: 63 mins.
Director: Sae Suzuki
Writer: N/A
Starring: Hinata Arakawa, Kaho Seto,
Not much is known about this film apart from Sae Suzuki made it while at Geidai.
Synopsis: Ray is a girl in her mid-teens and also a runaway from home. While on the streets she meets Aoi and ends up staying overnight in her apartment but, the very next evening, the two run away from the city after Rei kills someone trying to hurt Aoi and they head to a deserted rural village…
緑の雪 「Midori no Yuki」
Release Date: 2019
Duration: 20 mins.
Director: Takeshi Kogahara
Writer: Takeshi Kogahara (Screenplay)
Starring: Shin Furukawa, Natsuko Fuji
Takeshi Kogahara was at last year’s OAFF and Japan Cuts with his short film, a visually and aurally resplendent tale of first-love named Nagisa. This is his latest short and it looks to be equally moving.
Synopsis: An old man near the end of his life spends his days on his bed, occasionally visited by a carer. When he sees snow outside the window, he contemplates certain strong memories from his past.
Documentaries:
つつんで、ひらいて 「Tsutsunde, Hiraite」
Release Date: 2019
Duration: 94 mins.
Director: Nanako Hirose
Writer: N/A
Starring: Nobuyoshi Kikuchi, Isao Mitobe,
Bunbuku director Nanako Hirose follows her critically-acclaimed feature His Lost Name with a documentary on books!
Synopsis: Nanako Hirose spent three years (2015-18) following a world leading book designer named Nobuyoshi Kikuchi. He has been active for more than 40 years and has worked on more than 15,000 books. By following Kikuchi and the way he designs books by touching and understanding physical materials, the film looks at the manufacture and status of paper books in the digital age.
Vulnerable Histories (A Road Movie)
Release Date: 2018
Running Time: 79 mins.
Director/Concept: Koki Tanaka,
Starring: Woohi Chung, Christian Hofer
I first saw wrote about this one for my post about the Rotterdam Film Festival and it has remained in my memory despite me not having watched it. I like the concept and really want to see it.
Synopsis: Ethnic and cultural nationalism, xenophobia, and other racist and discriminatory sentiments are on the rise around the world as we build walls and shout angrily at each other. Kyoto-based film-maker Koki Tanaka made this film to challenge the trend of increasing hatred with the idea that people need to talk to each other to overcome differences.
In this film, Koki Tanaka and a camera crew follow two people living in Japan who are different from the norm: Christian, a half-Swiss, half-Japanese-American man and Woohi, a Japan-born third-generation Korean (zainichi) woman. We see them travel to various places and discuss the rise of prejudice and hate speech as well as the lack of protection for people who are targets for hatred. The subjects dictate the course of the conversation and through hearing their experiences and ideas on identity politics, we begin to understand that Japan isn’t simply a homogeneous country and that there are many issues not discussed in public.
This has been screened in art galleries and there were workshops connected to the film so audiences are encouraged to voice their views.
だってしょうがないじゃない 「Tatteshou ganai Janai」
Release Date: 2019
Duration: 120 mins.
Director: Yoshifumi Tsubota
Writer: N/A
Starring: Makoto Oohara, Yoshifumi Tsubota, Machiko Kimura, Yoshinori Kimura, Tatsuyoshi Tsubota, Yoko Tsubota, Masako Tsubota, Miharu Seki, Naoko Misawa, Hiroo Shibata,
Synopsis: The filmmaker, Yoshifumi Tsubota (The Shell Collector), who has suffered from mental illness, records what happens when he is diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) at a psychiatric hospital. He tells his mother who informs him that he has an uncle who has Pervasive Developmental Disorder and lives alone. Tsubota goes to see him.
初恋 「Hatsukoi」
Release Date: 2020
Duration: 108 mins.
Director: Takashi Miike
Writer: Masaru Nakamura (Screenplay)
Starring: Masataka Kubota, Becky, Jun Murakami, Nao Omori, Sakurako Konishi, Sansei Shiomi, Seiyo Uchino, Shota
Sometani,
There are reviews out for this one from when it played at the Director’s Fortnight in Cannes but I’m avoiding them so I can go into the film fresh. The actors include Masataka Kubota, who worked with Miike on 13 Assassins (2010), Nao Omori, the titular Ichi in Miike’s classic Ichi the Killer (2001), Shota Sometani, who appeared in Miike’s As the God’s Will (2014) and Lesson of the Evil (2013). Forget those recent films, from the details and the trailer this one looks to harken back to his late 90s/early 2000s output of the man.
Synopsis: Leo (Masataka Kubota) is a boxer whose career and life have hit the rocks. Losing fights and with a developing brain tumour, he is almost out for the count but then he meets his ‘first love’ Monica, a call-girl and an addict who is unwittingly caught up in a drug-smuggling scheme. Fate places them at the centre of a night-long chase where the two are pursued by a corrupt cop, a yakuza, his nemesis, and a female assassin sent by the Chinese Triads.
真実 「Shinjitsu」
Release Date: October 11th, 2019
Duration: 106 mins.
Director: Hirokazu Kore-eda
Writer: Hirokazu Kore-eda (Screenplay),
Starring: Catherine Deneuve, Juliette Binoche, Ethan Hawke, Clementine Grenier, Ludivine Sagnier,
Following on from his win of the Palme d’Or at last year’s Cannes Film Festival with Shoplifters, Kore-eda graces the Competition Section of this year’s Venice Film Festival with a film based in France and starring some of the luminaries of French cinema with Catherine Deneuve, Juliette Binoche and Ludivine Sagnier as well as Ethan Hawke, a truly talented American actor. This is the director’s first work set outside Japan but it features the sort of family narrative he is famous for as a clan is reunited in Paris and go through a cycle of lies, resentment, love and reconciliation.
Reviews have painted this one as another good Kore-eda film.
Synopsis: Fabienne (Catherine Deneuve) is a star of French cinema with the power to charm the men around her. When she publishes her memoirs, her daughter Lumir (Juliette Binoche) returns from New York to Paris with her husband (Ethan Hawke) and their young child and a reunion between mother and daughter kicks off a confrontation that leads to truths being told, accounts settled, loves and resentments confessed.
They Say Nothing Stays the Same 
ある船頭の話 「Aru sendou no hanashi」
Release Date: September 13th, 2019
Duration: 137 mins.
Director: Joe Odagiri
Writer: Joe Odagiri (Screenplay),
Starring: Akira Emoto, Ririka Kawashima, Nijiro Murakami, Masatoshi Nagase, Haruomi Hosono, Tsuyoshi Ihara, Mitsuko Kusabue, Isao Hashizume,
This is Joe (Mushishi, Adrift in Tokyo) Odagiri’s sophomore feature film as a director and he has hired a good team in getting Christopher Doyle – Wong Kar-Wai’s frequent collaborator – working cinematography and Emi Wada designing costumes – she won an Oscar for her costuming on Akira Kurosawa’s epic Ran and is responsible for costumes in lush historical dramas such as Samurai Marathon 1855, Hero, Gohatto, and House of Flying Daggers.
Synopsis: Toichi is a boatman who ferries people across a river. Despite ferrying people across, the only person he really communicates with is his young neighbour Genzo. When a large bridge begins to be constructed to help people cross the river it looks like Toichi will be made redundant but then he meets a mysterious young girl who appears to be an orphan. Toichi takes her in and from that moment, his life begins to change…
That’s it for now. I’ll update it if any other films are added.