Shinsedai guests (from l to r) Yasunobu Takahashi (Locked Out), Gen Takahashi (Confessions of a Dog), Tokachi Tsuchiya (A Normal Life, Please) and Akino Kondoh (Ladybird's Requiem), with Co-Programmer/ Co-Director Chris Magee and Excecutive Director James Heron
Actually this post title is a slightly misleading one. I have no intention of giving you a round up of last weekend’s Shinsedai Cinema Festival in Toronto. I’m too exhausted for a start, after another sleepless night courtesy of the newborn. In fact, I’m currently wondering if I am ever going to have the energy to attempt writing anything significant again. It’s at the 4pm mark at the moment, and I’m just a few minutes away from retreating back to bed after spending most of the day glowering unproductively through my headache at the screen. Secondly, as I wasn’t actually there in Toronto for the fest, my distant observations probably wouldn’t mean very much anyway. So instead, I just want to point you all in the direction of other some fest write-ups from those who actually were there. I will state first of all though that this year’s edition sounded like a rousing success, with attendances around double that of our inaugural year and a good time had by all, from what I’ve heard.
During the Opening Night screening of Kakera, Momoko Ando meets with a very special audience member, the esteemed director Deepa Mehta, as James Heron looks on
For those that are interested, first up there’s the Shinsedai website itself, which has two posts from Marc Saint-Cyr of the Toronto J-Film Pow-Wow written as the festival was ongoing. My co-programmer on Shinsedai, and Toronto J-Film Pow-Wow founder Chris Magee has also written up a review for Confessions of a Dog on his site, one of the talking point films of the fest, and one which viewers in the UK will have a chance to get a look at very soon. Cathy Munroe Hotes also has a review of the film on her blogspot, the Nishikata Film Review. (Just a quick note, but director Gen Takahashi has already had one film released on DVD in the UK, which is the completely-different Goth: Love Of Death.) The same site has a review of Yasunobu Takahashi’s Locked Out.
Toronto based experimental outfit Vowls get ready to lay down the live score to Kenji Mizoguchi's Water Magician
Bob Turnball of the Row Three blogspot has a review of the screening of Mizoguchi’s The Water Magician with live accompaniment by Vowls, a unique event I am really pissed off I wasn’t able to get out there for, but am glad to hear it was very well attended and people loved it, while Tetsuaki Matsue’s Live Tape gets a great write up on cineAWESOME. And I’m sure there’s more if you hunt around for it, but for now, to get a flavour of the mood of the weekend, check out Jon Jung’s photo album he put up on Facebook and take a listen to his VCinema podcast on the website Varied Celluloid, in which he and Marc Saint-Cyr talk about Kakera, followed by an interview with the film’s director and festival guest Momoko Ando. This is the first of a number of podcasts Jon Jung has planned from Shinsedai, and I should also say a big thanks to him for providing the pix that accompany the post. Thanks!
