Cinema

A Hijacking

No sooner had I got off the plane from Japan, it was time to dive right back into HKIFF. And what better way to do it than with this fantastic… Read More
Flicker

My last film at Okinawa was actually this Swedish comedy drama that picked up the AMD Next Wave award at Last year’s Fantastic Fest. Somehow I had failed to watch… Read More
Jellyfish

Going into this Okinawa World Premiere completely blind I could not have been more surprised by the film I saw. I had somehow failed to notice that Kaneto Shusuke’s film… Read More
Blue Bird

An unusual inclusion in the Local Origination Project section was this Hong Kong-set short from Horie Kei. Filmed in a combination of Cantonese, Mandarin and Japanese, it nevertheless proved an… Read More
Duty Cyborg Itoman

I was really keen to check out some of the homegrown offerings from Okinawan filmmakers while I was on the island, and this one in particular caught my eye, not… Read More
Umisuzu Meshi

Another tale in which food plays a prominent role, Nakajima Ryo’s film from Kadokawa-cho in Miyazaki prefecture is the story of two brothers who run the local bento restaurant. When… Read More
MG-2416

While the title doesn’t offer much of a clue, Taniguchi Hitonori’s film is a loving homage to the work of directors like Quentin Tarantino, Tobe Hooper and Iguchi Noboru. Centring… Read More
7 Days Report

High schooler Ryota (Shirahama Aran) is a week from graduating when he discovers that he is really a clone. In fact his entire school is part of an experiment designed… Read More
El Shuriken Vs. Evil Intention

“Deru-cine” is a special filmmaking project helmed by writer Goto Hirohito, which discards the traditional notion of audiences watching films (“miru cinema”), in favour of appearing in the film themselves… Read More
The Complex

The Okinawa International Film Festival kicked off in earnest with the Asian premiere of Nakata Hideo’s latest dose of J-Horror, The Complex. The film stars former AKB48 member Maeda Atsuko… Read More
The Deflowering of Eva van End

Playing like a Dutch version of Wes Anderson or Todd Solondz, Michiel ten Horn’s deliciously black comedy sees a high-strung middle class suburban family hrown into meltdown when a German… Read More
After Lucia

Superb character drama from Mexico that follows a father and daughter battling to put their lives back on track following the death of their wife and mother. Alejandra (Tessa Ia)… Read More
Drug War

Johnnie To heads to the mainland for this tense, absorbing thriller starring the excellent Sun Hong Lei as a dedicated cop trying to take down a complex drug operation that… Read More
Library Wars

From the director of Gantz comes the big screen live action adaptation of the popular novels. In a Bradbury/Orwell future where books are burned as subversive, a young woman joins… Read More
Ip Man: The Final Fight

Opening this year’s HK International Film Festival is Herman Yau’s follow up to The Legend Is Born. Anthony Wong stars as an aging Ip Man, forced to abandon his wing… Read More
Mama

Guillermo del Toro dons his executive producer hat once again, helping first-time writer-director Andres Muschetti adapt his 2008 short film into a feature. Shot in Canada, Mama tells the story… Read More
The Croods

From the creative team behind How To Train Your Dragon comes this prehistoric animated comedy, originally conceived as a project for Aardman Animation, with an original script by John Cleese. Read More
Oz the Great and Powerful

Sam Raimi (The Evil Dead, Spider-man) re-teams with James Franco for this big budget prequel to the classic MGM musical, dispensing with the songs but layering on the lurid 3D… Read More