The 40th Hong Kong International Film Festival will present 11 extraordinary 8mm works by Japanese filmmakers made from the late 1970s to the late 80’s. The programme, "Hachimiri Madness – Japanese Indies from the Punk Years", is a collaboration with Japan’s PIA Film Festival and the Berlin International Film Festival.
The restored films represent a period when the nine filmmakers were honing their youthful skills and dreams with the once-popular 8mm format. The late 70’s to late 80’s were perhaps for Japanese cinema the final years before it became tamed and disciplined, and the last blossoming of filmmakers who could not help but let their imaginations run wild.
Some of the filmmakers have today become household names, including the very prolific SONO Sion (who has two other recent titles in this year’s line-up: The Whispering Stars and Shinjuku Swan, 2015), YAGUCHI Shinobu (Waterboys, 2001) and TSUKAMOTO Shinya (Fires on the Plain, 2014). The films are diverse in themes, styles and approaches, yet connected by that heady and magnificent vision: Life is Cinema, and Cinema is Life. The collection of full-length features and short films were restored from their 8mm original positive to 2K digital, and include newly translated English subtitles.
The 11 films in the programme are:
Isolation of 1/880000 (ISHII Sogo, 1977)
The Adventure of Denchu-Kozo (TSUKAMOTO Shinya, 1988)
I am Sion Sono ! ! (SONO Sion, 1984)
Tokyo Cabbageman K (OGATA Akira, 1980)
Saint Terrorism (YAMAMOTO Masashi, 1980)
Hanasareru Gang (SUWA Nobuhiro, 1984)
A Man’s Flower Road (SONO Sion, 1986)
Happiness Avenue (HIRANO Katsuyuki, 1986)
UNK (TEZUKA Makoto, 1979)
High-School-Terror (TEZUKA Makoto, 1979)
The Rain Women (YAGUCHI Shinobu, 1990)
The HKIFF speaks with Curator Jacob WONG about the programme.
HKIFF: How did the programme get started?
WONG: In the summer of 2014 I was in Tokyo and ARAKI Keiko told me she was organizing an all-night 8mm programme from the 80’s. I was immediately intrigued though going to the films at 11.30pm and staying up until 5.30am when the Metro started running again was a bit daunting. The PIA Film Festival was the major force in independent filmmaking in Japan, especially in the 70’s and 80’s. It was (and still is) running a competition and all, literally all, young filmmakers entered it. OSHIMA Nagisa was most supportive of the event and that lent it extra weight to the event. I may be stretching it a bit, but certainly not a lot, to say that everybody who’s anybody in Japanese cinema today has taken part in PIA as a young filmmaker.
HKIFF: Was there a big turnout at that all-night event? And the programme?
WONG: It played in the Shinjuku Theater, a "stronghold" of the Japanese indie scene. I think there were about 200 people, all quite young and I wondered if that wasn’t it the first time for that audience to see those films, and in their original 8mm format. I remember there were 6 or 7 films in the programme. For me, I have seen SONO Sion’s I am Sono Sion! !and A Man’s Flower Road, and TSUKAMOTO Shinya’s The Adventure of Denchu-Kozo, as they are quite well-known, have traveled to film festivals and have been released on DVD. YAGUCHI Shinobu’s The Rain Womenwas the pleasant surprise of that morning. It’s very unrestrained and playful, full of the glories of youth. YAGUCHI’s become a successful industry player, but has retained the playfulness in his mainstream movies still retain that early playfulness.
HKIFF: When did you decide to bring those films to Hong Kong?
WONG: When I was seeing those films. I know PIA has more and it would be great fun to go through them, put together a programme and bring them to Hong Kong. And then I thought, why only Hong Kong? I thought of Christoph TERHECHTE, Director of the Forum of the Berlin IFF, and wrote him about my adventure the next day. As I had expected, he was full of enthusiasm, and together with Keiko we decided that PIA, Berlin and Hong Kong would collaborate to curate a programme, restore the prints and put in English subtitles.
HKIFF: And then?
WONG: And then over the next a year and a half or two years, we saw more 8mm films. I went to Tokyo in 2015 again for another Keiko's all-nighter, and Christoph and I were in Tokyo twice specifically to see films at the PIA office. Eventually we locked the programme, and the hard work began: liaising with the filmmakers, restoration and translation of subtitles. PIA took up all of that work. Christoph, who was also knowledgeable about restoration, also gave advice.
HKIFF: Are all the films in the programme from PIA? Surely there are films that did not enter the competition?
WONG: Except St. Terrorism by YAMAMOTO Masashi. PIA showed another film of his at the first all-nighter. I wrote to him about the programme and he said he had a "better" film, closer to the 16mm cult classic Carnival by Night, which was St. Terrorism. Of course there were 8mm filmmakers who didn't enter the PIA events. One of them was the Okinawa-based director TAKAMINE Ko, but I only found out too late to include any of his films.
HKIFF: Are you able to show all the films you want in the programme?
WONG: No. There are films that Keiko, Christoph and I would love to include in the programme, but the filmmakers wouldn’t agree.
HKIFF: Why?
WONG: The filmmakers were very modest. They thought, actually insisted, that those films they made in their youth were not good enough.
HKIFF: Could you tell us who they are?
WONG: No.
HKIFF: Is there anything about these films that particularly strikes you?
WONG: Youth. The films convey a very strong feeling that anything and everything is possible, that cinema has limitless possibilities, that cinema is freedom. The influence of the French New Wave is quite apparent but there is also something specifically "Japanese" about them: the urge to breakthrough confinement and restrictions, to go to the edges, to explore extremes. It’s madness, real, total and unadulterated madness, in the very best sense of the word. Several of these films are feature length monsters running 120 minutes. A 8mm reel is about 4 minutes. A lot of passion and guts need to go into making that kind of 8mm film.
HKIFF: Do you have a favourite among the 11 films in the programme?
WONG: Certainly not. All good films being equal. Though I remember being touched seeing HIRANO Katsuyuki’s Happiness Avenue, knowing a little about where life and career has eventually taken him. He started out as a social and sexual rebel and has stayed a social and sexual rebel. I should also admit that there's a bit of nostalgia seeing and thinking about these films. The filmmakers were young and just starting out. They knew one another and worked on one another's films. SONO Sion was an actor in HIRANO's Happiness Avenue, SUWA Nobuhiro was assistant cameraman in YAMAMOTO's St. Terrorism, TEZUKA Makoto played in TSUKAMOTO's Denchu-Kozo… All the fun and glory of independent filmmaking, all the love and anarchy.