For cinema-lovers here, a special Valentine’s Day gift is coming from the Japan Foundation, and that’s the annual Japanese Film Festival (JFF), that will run online from Feb. 14th to the 27th. At a special media event held virtually, we got the lowdown on what will be happening this year, and there’s much to look forward to.
Ben Suzuki and Masafumi Konomi
Ben Suzuki, Director of the Japan Foundation handled the Welcome remarks, and we had Masafumi Konomi, JFF Director & Liza Diño of FDCP chiming in on how welcome this Festival would be, as it’s all about celebrating Love, the Arts, & Cinema. The strong connections between the Philippines & Japan was mentioned, and how there’s so much we share between the two cultures.
Liza Diño of the FDCP
Director Konomi talked about how this concept of a JFF began in 1972, fifty years ago, as a medium by which the world could better understand and appreciate Japanese culture. Here in the Philippines, it’s been going on for twenty years now.
Kanami Namaki offered us a rundown of the 20 films that comprise this year’s festival line up. And it’s an exciting mix of coming of age films, of stories about family and the social divide, of fantasy, about women, about Ramen, about androids, and there’s even a four century old war depicted in one of the films.
Among the ones that caught my eye were an anime film titled Datema Inverted, culinary films such as The God of Ramen, and The Bread of Happiness (shot in Hokkaido), and the social commentary of The Aristocrats. The classic Kurosawa film, Rashomon, is among the twenty films being screened.
Throughout the Festival’s period, one just head to JFF Online, register and create an account, then pick the films you’ll want to watch. You can only watch a selected film once, but think about it, it’s all from the comfort of home and at your convenience (given certain terms and conditions). And it goes without saying that the window of opportunity to watch these films lapses after Feb. 27.
Congratulations in advance to the Japan Foundation, to JTI, and to the FDCP. I’ve been an avoid follower of the JFF pre-pandemic, and am happy to see it continuing its excellent work, and launching its 2nd online version.
Japanese films are certainly on the rise again, as we witness the buzz surrounding Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Drive My Car. It’ll be rewarding to watch these curated 2021 & 2020 films online.