japanese
New Docs Japan
  • Chizuru
  • Give Back Kama’s Rights! 2011
  • Goodbye UR—Japanese Social Housing Crisis
  • Never Let Me Go
  • September 11
  • Transgender Trouble
  • True to Myself
  • Yes, I Am Here
  • BETWEEN YESTERDAY & TOMORROW Omnibus Vol. 1 “APRIL 2011,” Omnibus Vol. 2 “MAY 2011”
  • Associations of Silverpencils
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    Give Back Kama’s Rights! 2011

    (Kama no juminhyo o kaese! 2011)
    - JAPAN / 2011 / Japanese / Color / Blu-ray (SD) / 50 min

    Director, Editing: Kim Imman (NDS)
    Photography: Kim Imman, Nunokawa Tetsuro, Sato Leo, Nakamura Yoko, Kajii Hiroshi, Otagiri Mizuho, Kawase Shunji
    Producer: NDS (Nakazaki-cho Documentary Space)
    Source: Kim Imman

    In Kamagasaki, a neighborhood in Osaka’s Nishinari Ward, lies Japan’s largest flophouse, where many day laborers are listed as living. In one small five-story building, approximately 3,300 workers and homeless people have registered their addresses, as is necessary in Japan to obtain employment and voting rights. Arguing that they do not actually live there, city authorities have moved to eliminate their registrations. Furious, those affected and their supporters rise up. The camera captures the passion of their fight.


    [Director’s Statement] In the process of more than four years of shooting there have been all kinds of encounters: between filmmaker and subject, as well as between filmmakers themselves. The number of cameras increased, edits followed upon edits, and the footage was screened again and again. And this led to collaborations . . . Screenings become encounters, and from there the next narrative and the next documentary begin. I am grateful for the opportunity to screen the film again on this occasion, and look forward to new encounters and collaborations.


    - (center, front row)

    Kim Imman

    Born in 1960 in Nagata Ward, Kobe, to second-generation Zainichi Korean parents with roots on the Korean island of Jeju. Formed Nakazakicho Documentary Space (NDS) in Summer 2007 with associates who met one another while witnessing the forced removal of homeless people from Osaka’s Nagai Park. In 2009, Kim relocated to Kamagasaki and began independent documentary production and exhibition activities, most notably the Spring 2010 screening event “In Pursuit of Wandering Souls from NDU to NDS.”