japanese

Yamagata and Film

Supported by Yamagata Prefectural Foundation of Lifelong Learning and Culture

The Yamagata and Film program offers a multifaceted view of the past, present, and future role of film in Yamagata. Held for the fourth time this year, this program highlights Yamagata’s rich cinematic resources as it depicts the growth and evolution of Yamagata as a “creative city of visual culture.” This year, we are pleased to present a joint screening program featuring offerings from the Tohoku University of Art and Design, the China Academy of Art and the University of Milan, in addition to the Visual Folk History of Yamagata program that features recently unearthed archival footage of the region’s folk history and culture, the Yamagata in Film program which shows the Yamagata of the 1950s and 1960s as preserved in silver halide film and magic lantern slides, and a symposium that will examine and consider the future of film culture in Yamagata.

Venues: Central Public Hall 6F, Yamagata Citizens’ Hall (Large Hall), Yamagata Museum of Art 2, 5


Three University Program

The China Academy of Art, located in Hangzhou, China, and the Tohoku University of Art and Design in Yamagata City have each taken an original approach to film education, while the University of Milan has contributed to the development of the visual culture of the region by hosting Milan’s Docucity Film Festival and supporting a film archive project devoted to the collection and preservation of home movies and amateur film footage. Along with filmmakers from each of the three regions, professors and students from these three universities will assemble in Yamagata with their films for a screening program and symposium on the theme of “Film Education and the Creation of Local Culture.” Participants will be encouraged to contribute regional and global viewpoints to an ongoing discussion of the future of filmmaking and the development of visual culture, and works from the Kyoto University of Art and Design will also be shown in this program.

Tohoku University of Art and Design 1
A Doodlebug’s Pit  Hiroi Saki
Kids After It  Kato Takuto
Tohoku University of Art and Design 2
share  Nakajima Yu
The Three Girls and Their Three Secrets  Saito Risa, Wada Haruna, Nihei Tomomi
Deidoro  Funayama Hiroko
The Hina Doll’s Head  Funayama Hiroko
Time  Maeda Yuka
Henri  Maeda Yuka
Halcyon days  Kazama Hiroki
China Academy of Art 1
Hai Tang  Fu Fan
Illegal Being 2  Liu Zhihai
China Academy of Art 2
I am the Son of a Passing Lark  Xu Xiaodong
China Academy of Art 3
Beachcombers  Sun Xiaona
The Bandsman  Wei Xiaofei
Youth  Zhao Hang
Between  Wang Shuai
China Academy of Art 4
Funeral Home  Liao Jianfen
Next to Heaven  Chen Yangyang
She Sleeps Next Door  Li Renrui
The Bridge  Huang Honghui
China Academy of Art 5
Life on the Stage  Qian Siru, Chen Zhongda
Talking with My Grandmother  Yang Li
Cart Driver No. 652  Jin Chaofan
Orphans  Chen Junguang
University of Milan 1
Maybe Things Will Change  Andrea Segre
Good Buy Roma  Gaetano Crivaro, Margherita Pisano
University of Milan 2
My Marlbolo City  Valentina Pedicini
Doble Forza  Lorenzo Tripodi, Manuela Conti
Summer Flies Away  Andrea Caccia
42—Stories from a Building-World  Francesca Cogni, Donatello De Mattia
Kyoto University of Art and Design Program
Waltz  Asano Maki, Yoshimura Aya
A Brief Slice of Time  Sakanishi Miiku
mort  Aoyama Risa
The Door  Yoshida Mayu, Nozawa Akane
A Boy and a Girl  Fujii Kyohei
Emi’s Personal God  Nakamura Satoi
Tohoku Univ. of Art and Design 1 Oct. 11 M2
China Academy of Art 1 | University of Milan 1 | China Academy of Art 2 | China Academy of Art 3 Oct. 12 M2
Tohoku Univ. of Art and Design 2 | University of Milan 2 | China Academy of Art 4 Oct. 13 M2
Kyoto Univ. of Art and Design | China Academy of Art 5 Oct. 14 M2
Three Universities Symposium Oct. 15 M5

“Presentation on Home Movies Association—Expanded Archives”

This presentation will introduce the work that the National Archive of Family Films has carried out in Italy from 2002 onwards, in addition to the innovative approach developed in a community-hosted open archive that is continually oriented towards the recontextualization of our preserved film heritage.

Presentation: Gianmarco Torri (Home Movies Association / Docucity Film Festival Co-Curator)

Lecture and Symposium: Striving to Become a Creative City of Visual Culture

Yamagata has gained a reputation as a “film capital” not only because of the documentary film festival that it hosts, but also because of the many diverse film-related efforts that have been made in the region from the end of the Second World War to the present day. This symposium will serve as an opportunity for learning and discussion as it presents the active film initiatives currently taking place in Yamagata alongside the past history and future potential of the region.

Speaker: Sasaki Masayuki (Graduate School for Creative Cities, Osaka City University)

Visual Folk History of Yamagata

This documentary brings together valuable vintage film footage featuring the traditional arts of Yamagata, along with bygone customs and traditions belonging to an older age. Viewers will witness a stately Noh performance, a New Year festival that extends through the night in a lonely village, men who worship sacred phallic objects as they cry, “Grow larger and reach the sky!”, and gatherings of blind shrine maidens. Experts in the field will also take part in a discussion session on the subject of folk documentaries.

Kurokawa Noh  1954
Ogisai Festival  1954
Onakama  1982
Ogare-Ogare  1982
Talk: Higashi Masao

Yamagata in Film

This program will feature nostalgic images of Yamagata captured in promotional films made by the city and amateur 8 mm film footage. The now-defunct Yamagata Kotsu Railway Sanzan Line and Takahata Line will return to the screen along with scenic images of the 1960s.

Yamagata in Film 1
Yamagata City Newsreel No. 1–3  1959–1960
A New Mountain Route  1964
A Greater Yamagata  Circa 1959
Yamagata in Film 2
Yamagata City Newsreel No. 5–7  ?–1962
Our Institutions and Facilities
Sasaya Tunnel  Circa 1960
Prefectural News: New Cities, New Towns  Circa 1956
Kiyotaki Akira Films
Images of Autumn  1986
Sanzan Line in Winter  1974
Bygone Days of the Sanzan Line  1974
Battling the Snow  1974
Adieu Sanzan Line  1974
New Destinations  1975

YIDFF 2013 Opening Screening
Yamagata City Newsreel No. 4  1961
Restoration of the Konpon Chudo Temple  1963
Opening Screening Oct. 10 A6
Kiyotaki Akira Films Oct. 11 M2
Yamagata in Film 1 Oct. 14 CL
Yamagata in Film 2 Oct. 15 CL

Images of Family in the Magic Lantern

This year, we are pleased to once again have the opportunity to present our magic lantern slide show. This program will feature a variety of postwar images of the family as represented in vintage magic lantern slides of the 1950s, encompassing themes ranging from marriage and childbirth to rural farming villages and industrial zones. Included in this year’s lineup is The Role of the Wife (1954), which revolves around a farming family in the Takiyama district of Yamagata.

Co-presented by The Collaborative Research Center for Theatre and Film Arts of Waseda University 2013 Research Project, ‘Revival and re-development of gentou (slide) in the Showa period Japan’ (Principal researcher: Washitani Hana)
In Cooperation with Kobe Planet Film Archive, International Institute for Children’s Literature, Osaka, The Open Research Center for Minamata Studies of Kumamoto Gakuen University


Tora-chan and the Bride
Painless Childbirth, Part 1: Understanding Painless Labor
Lifestyle Improvements—the Role of the Wife: Life for Women in Farming Families
Nikoyon
Daddy Went on a Bicycle