Half-Life in Fukushima

Samurai Japan: The Story Behind the WBC Clean Sweep

March 2024 •Japanese

Samurai Japan won the 2023 World Baseball Classic for the first time in 14 years, and went all the way to the final undefeated. In addition to the never-before-seen footage of the team, the film also includes interviews with Manager Hideki Kuriyama, players, coaches, and team staff. What is the truth behind the glory and the suffering of the people involved?

Fukushima

Invalid date •English

The definitive account of Japan’s struggle as it faced a nuclear catastrophe while still reeling from the devastation of an earthquake and tsunami.

Matsuko in Real Life

January 2025 •Japanese

Matsuko Deluxe explores the seemingly familiar yet overlooked facets of Japanese culture through real-life experiences.

A Visit to Hokusai

October 2014 •French

A look at the work of Japanese woodblock printing artist Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849).

Arirang Rhapsody

February 2024 •Japanese

The protagonists of the film are the Zainichi Korean women living in Kawasaki. They were tossed about by the war, and after many trips to and fro across the sea in search of a place to live, they finally arrived in Kawasaki, where they have lived modestly and vigorously.

Garage Rockin' Craze

January 2017 •Japanese

A savage journey into the heart of underground Tokyo rock and roll, a look at the people who make it thrive, and stories of their dedication to keeping DIY culture alive.

One Piece - En route vers l'épisode 1000

November 2021 •French

Fence

January 2008 •Japanese

Before World War II, Ikego village was an idyllic agriculture community. The Imperial Navy took over the village and the hills to build the largest ammunition preserve in Asia. When Japan lost, these facilities were taken over by the US Navy, and are now housing for the American soldiers.

Dear Pyongyang

January 2006 •Japanese

Dear Pyongyang is a documentary film by Zainichi Korean director Yang Yong-hi (Korean: 양영희, Hanja: 梁英姬) about her own family. It was shot in Osaka Japan (Yang's hometown) and Pyongyang, North Korea, In the 1970s, Yang's father, an ardent communist and leader of the pro-North movement in Japan, sent his three sons from Japan to North Korea under a repatriation campaign sponsored by ethnic activist organisation and de facto North Korean embassy Chongryon; as the only daughter, Yang herself remained in Japan. However, as the economic situation in the North deteriorated, the brothers became increasingly dependent for survival on the care packages sent by their parents. The film shows Yang's visits to her brothers in Pyongyang, as well as conversations with her father about his ideological faith and his regrets over breaking up his family.

When the Impressionists Discovered Japan

May 2018 •French

From 1853, Japan opens up to the West. Numerous works of art and woodcuts find their way to Europe. The Impressionists and later the European artistic avant-garde succumb to this one passion: Japonism. 150 years after the beginning of the Meiji period in 1868, the film traces the connections between Japan and the Western world.

Horizon

January 1971 •

This work was created to commemorate the reversion of Okinawa to Japan.

Un po' di Giappone

January 1990 •Italian

In the 1980s, Michelangelo Antonioni traveled with his partner, actress and filmmaker Enrica Fico Antonioni, to Japan with the intent of creating a documentary, Un viaggio in Giappone, that would chronicle “the social transformations undergoing in Japan through the experimental use of new film technologies,” specifically the Betacam. Un po' di Giappone is the shortened version of the documentary.

Nuclear Nation

June 2012 •Japanese

After the 11 March 2011 tsunami and nuclear disaster, residents of Futaba, a town in Fukushima Prefecture, are relocated to an abandoned high school in a suburb of Tokyo, 150 miles south. With a clear and compassionate eye, filmmaker Atsushi Funahashi follows the displaced people as they struggle to adapt to their new environment. Among the vivid personalities who emerge are the town mayor, a Moses without a Promised Land; and a farmer who would rather defy the government than abandon his cows to certain starvation.

Un samouraï au Vatican

August 2018 •French

Why do 600 inhabitants of the small southern Spanish town of Coria del Río bear the surname "Japón"? It is the legacy of an unusual expedition that took place 400 years ago: In October 1613, the samurai Hasekura Tsunenaga boarded the galleon "San Juan Bautista" on behalf of the ruler Date Masamune in Sendai, Japan. In addition to merchants, warriors and Spanish sailors, the Spanish Franciscan monk Luis Sotelo, who spoke fluent Japanese, also embarked. The legation wanted to obtain permission from the Spanish King Philip III and Pope Paul V to open a new sea route to India alongside the spice route; in return, Christian missionaries were to be sent to Japan. When he set off, Hasekura Tsunenaga had no idea that the journey would take seven years. Who was this Japanese samurai? What is known about his motives and what is known about the actual background to the expedition?

Click to Ransom

October 2022 •English

A small rural hospital in Japan battles an international cybercriminal gang that is holding them ransom with their stolen patient data.

Ona Carbonell: Starting Over

February 2022 •Spanish

In August 2020, Olympic artistic swimmer Ona Carbonell became a first time mother, an experience that reshaped her life overnight.

Path of the Plume

April 2025 •English

Nuclear weapons are instruments of mass destruction that exact a devastating toll on human life. In the heart of rural Utah, the Lovell family recounts the harrowing tale of nuclear testing’s shadowy legacy and impact on innocent civilians

À nos terres : Autonomia paisana

March 2024 •French

Aldo Giannini: Pacific Theatre

January 2014 •English

Like many other young men of his generation, after Pearl Harbor was attacked, Aldo Giannini joined the Marines with little idea of what lay ahead. After training, he was quickly deployed overseas and fought in the bloody Battle of Tarawa, surviving with a shrapnel injury and the haunting memory of witnessing the loss of 3,250 U.S. lives. He went on to fight in other battles and returned home after 3 intense years of service. Nearly eight decades later, he still questions if winning the island was worth the price.

Japon, aux racines du soleil

July 2020 •French