Other Screenings
Special Invitation Films
Our opening screening is Yamagata Broadcasting’s television documentary Seasonal Work in Tokyo, which won an award of excellence in 1965 by the National Association of Commercial Broadcasters in Japan. It observes a group of migrant workers at a Yamazaki bread factory with a humorous touch.
Our closing screening, Regarding the Lives of Others, takes a look back at the work of Tsuchimoto Noriaki, known for his series of films on Minamata Disease, and cameraman Otsu Koshiro, who shot documentaries by Tsuchimoto, Ogawa Shinsuke, Sato Makoto and others.
Additionally, Ogawa Shinsuke’s early work The Oppressed Students (1967) will be screened with English subtitles for the first time ever.
In advance of the theatrical release of Romances sans Paroles, we present Wang Bing’s Man with No Name from China.
Far from Afghanistan: The October Edition is a special event of Far From Afghanistan—an omnibus by a collection of filmmakers (from outside and inside Afghanistan) utilizing a mosaic of approaches to explore issues of shared responsibility, history, and memory in a concerted effort to help accelerate resistance to the war (including Travis Wilkerson, Jon Jost, and John Gianvito, who are scheduled to attend YIDFF 2011). Far From Afghanistan: The October Edition presents, online and at YIDFF only, segments of the forthcoming film to mark the October 6, 2011 10-year anniversary of the war.
Venues: Yamagata Central Public Hall 6F, Yamagata Citizens’ Hall, Yamagata Museum of Art 1
Seasonal Work in Tokyo • Oct. 6 A6 | The Oppressed Students • Oct. 7 M1 | Man With No Name • Oct. 8 CL
Far from Afghanistan: The October Edition • Oct. 12 CS | Regarding the Lives of Others • Oct. 12 A6
YIDFF Network Special Screenings
The YIDFF Network is a volunteer group that was brought together for the inaugural YIDFF in 1989, as an initiative of Ogawa Shinsuke. Since that time, the group has continued to be active on a wide range of levels. YIDFF Network Special Screenings are organized for each Festival, with the intention of presenting films from the volunteers’ original perspectives.
Venues: Forum 3
- Reviving Recipes
- Watanabe Satoshi / 2011 / 100 min
www.y-recipe.net
A tale of heirloom vegetables and their producers, spun by those who cultivate the fertile relationship between food and agriculture.
Art Documentary Program
Venues: Yamagata Institute of the Arts, Forum 3
- Roundabout, Colors of Soundsteps
- Oki Masaharu / 2011 / 98 min
www.tuad.ac.jp/newsevents/ . . .
A documentary film of an exhibition held last October at Yamagata Manabikan titled “Yamagata Journey 2010” by illustrator and picture book author Arai Ryoji.
- Water Children
- Aliona van der Horst / 2011 / 75 min
www.tuad.ac.jp/newsevents/ . . .
A documentary film focusing on the production of installation “Wasted” by pianist and artist Mukaiyama Tomoko, who resides in the Netherlands.
Yamagata Film Critics’ Workshop
This project aims to encourage thinking, writing, and reading on film using documentaries as an entry point, while offering immersion in the live atmosphere of a film festival. Participants will receive guidance from professional film critics and will write their own articles, which will be presented publicly. At a symposium to be held during the workshop, a panel of filmmakers, film scholars, and film critics will discuss the current state of documentary film criticism and the outlook for the future.
Venues: Yamagata Manabikan
- • Mentors: Chris Fujiwara, Kitakoji Takashi
Chris Fujiwara (film critic, USA)
Chris Fujiwara is a film critic whose books include Jerry Lewis; The World and Its Double: The Life and Work of Otto Preminger; and Jacques Tourneur: The Cinema of Nightfall. He writes for a range of publications from daily newspapers to specialized film journals such as Film Comment and Sight and Sound. He was invited to the Ozu centenary symposium in Tokyo in 2003. He has taught at Tokyo University, Yale University, and elsewhere. He has mentored young film critics at the Berlin International Film Festival’s Talent Campus since 2003.
Kitakoji Takashi (film critic, Japan)
Associate professor at Kyoto University of Art and Design’s Department of Film Production, part-time lecturer at Seikei University, and visiting researcher at National Film Center (The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo). Author of “Wong Kar-Wai-teki Renai,” and co-author of “Eiga no Seijigaku,” “Pedro Costa: Toi Heya kara no Koe,” and “Zero Nendai + no Eiga.” His film criticism appears in publications including the Asahi Shimbun, Soen, and Kinema Junpo.
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Yamagata Film Critics’ Workshop at mubi.com
Three English-language participants and three Japanese-language participants have been selected from applicants to this year’s Yamagata Film Critics’ Workshop. During the YIDFF, they will be writing film critiques on films in the program and interacting with mentors Chris Fujiwara and Kitakoji Takashi.
The texts written in English by participants in the Film Critics’ Workshopwill be published during the festival by mubi.com, one of the world's fastest-growing web sites for lovers of worldwide independent and classic cinema. Check it out starting October 8 at:
This project which encourages thinking, writing, and reading on film using documentary, includes a symposium on Saturday, Oct. 8. A panel offilmmakers, film scholars, and film critics will discuss the current state of documentary film criticism and the outlook for the future.