Saturday, June 4th @7PM
Eyes on Japan program 1:
LUNAR MARIA + Japanese Shorts Showcase
LUNAR MARIA (dir: Koji Hagiuda)
A household in the Tokyo area. Shizuko Yuzuki lives with Harue, mother of her husband who abandoned them five years ago. Harue has been suffering from dementia for three years and doesn't even remember Shizuko's name. Day after day, Harue wanders in search of the missing Yutaka. Shizuko spends her days caring for her ailing mother-in-law. One day, a burglary shakes the neighborhood. The injured thief takes to hiding in the Yuzuki family's house but is discovered by Shizuko. The thief presses his hand on Shizuko's mouth as she tries to scream. Shizuko desperately fights back. Harue approaches the two, unaware of the danger she's facing... But the surprising words that leave her lips sets in motion a chain of events that will bring a ray of light into the Yuzuki household..
A STRANGE NOISE (dir: Akiko Ikeda)
A story about a man who was urgently admitted to the hospital suffering from a strange noise.
PAY PHONE (dir: Yurugu Matsumoto)
Saki in her late twenties unexpectedly gets an incoming call from a pay phone. The caller is her father Sizuo, who lives apart from her. Reunited for the first time after a long time, they are both clumsy and two of a kind. A small night’s small story where their feelings intersect
RIGHT PLACE (dir: Kosai Sekine)
A man who works at a convenience store has OCD. His OCD fixation about placing things in the right place starts escalating... A comedy short film cynically capturing Tokyo.
ROBIN (dir: qurata kenji)
This is a story about the other side of the world. A daughter grows up without her father, who was a photographer. However, she and her mother only have one photo of him at home. She sees how much her mother misses him and goes on a Social media app called “ROBIN” to find special gifts from all over the world. “Love makes the New World go round.”
SKY SKY (dir: Shinji Kuma)
A girl who is saddened when her favorite dog suddenly disappears. The father, who could not tell her that the dog had died in the accident, encouraged the girl by saying that he had gone to play in the sky. The girl who believed the words wrote to the dog, put it on a balloon, and released it into the sky. Will the dog reply to the girl who is waiting for her to reply?
A talkback with the filmmakers and reception will follow the screening.
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This program is sponsored by The Dragon Route Shoryudo in Japan
