“Road to Cannes” Young filmmakers discussed about the current Japanese filmmaking and its future with Director Koji Fukada, Director Naomi Kawase and Tetsuya Bessho.
Japanese Filmmaker Reinforce Training Project, “Road to Cannes” was held at the 4th Nara International Film Festival on September 18th, 2016.
12 young Japanese directors praticipated to this event discussed what is currently lacking in Japanese filmmaking, as well as the main differences between Japanese and global filmmaking with Koji Fukada, whose film “Harmonium” won the Jury Prize in the Un Certain Regard division at the 69th Cannes International Film Festival, Naomi Kawase, the Executive Producer of Nara International Film Festival and Tetsuya Bessho, the representative of Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia.
Naomi Kawase, the jury for the Cannes Film Festival’s Cinefondation and short film selection, mentioned that she wanted to have a chance to discuss with Japanese young filmmakers how our movie culture can be improved in order to produce influential films evaluated as winning motion pictures through world standards. Tetsuya Bessho pointed out that Japanese filmmakers tend to think that their work would be well accepted as long as it is good however it is not true. He talked how important for filmmakers to have producer and staff who they can trust and work closely.
Director Fukada said that he started receiving attentions from outside of Japan after his work had been nominated to Rome Film Festival in 2008. He also explained the importance of expressing your own words as a filmmaker to promote the work to the global market. He believes that one of the reasons why his film was selected for Cannes is because his statement attached to his film expressed what he wanted to depict in the film and what he wanted to deliver to the audience.
In the afternoon, each participants presented the future project and the three masters gave their advise how to solve potential problems arising from shared lodging plans, and how to map out how it will be implemented.
You can also check the “Master Class by Naomi Kawase” held in June at Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia here.