"Family Circle: The Films of Yasujiro Ozu" at Seattle Art Museum: Mar 23 - May 18

Twelve years have elapsed since Northwest Film Forum's astounding 5 week, 27 film series, Sacred Cinema: The Yasujiro Ozu Retrospective of early 2005. In the ensuing decade span of time there have been notable single screenings of the Japanese master's film, but nothing approaching the selection on offer in Seattle Art Museum's Family Circle: The Films of Yasujiro Ozu. Illustrating the significance of Yasujiro Ozu's body of work, there are few better points of entry than Mark Schilling's "Re-Examining Ozu on Film". 50 years after the director's death, Japan Times hosted this great overview of the director's life, cinema, cultural and social contribution to Japan's post-War image of itself. It's of note that what many consider to be his masterpiece, "Tokyo Story" was Rated #1 in the director's poll and #3 in the critics' poll in the British Film Institute's Greatest Films of All Time feature of 2012. Ozu's stature among directors and lovers of world cinema further reinforced by pieces like Dave Thompson's Best Arthouse Films of All-Time column, Peter Bradshaw's "The Quiet Master" and Ian Buruma's "Yasujiro Ozu: An Artist of the Unhurried World", for The Guardian. Further reading can be found in David Bordwell's essay for Criterion, "Tokyo Story: Compassionate Detachment" and The Guardian's reviews of his final films, all going some way to describe why Ozu's quiet, poetic and personal reflections on Japanese society are regarded as legendary within the canon of world cinema. Another essential element of the filmography explored in Bradshaw's feature on Ozu's longtime lead and on-screen avatar, "The Heart-Wrenching Performance of Setsuko Hara, Ozu's Quiet Muse". On the subject of the western reception of Ozu, and Japanese film in general, the genesis of recognition and appreciation can be largely traced the work of one man and the retrospective of five films curated by critic Donald Richie for the 1963 Berlin Film Festival. Predating this influential moment in film history, Richie was a champion of all things Japanese cinema, as a post-War Japanese citizen, journalist and critic, author of "Ozu: His Life and Films" and reviews like that which he did for Ozu's "Floating Weeds" upon it's release in 1959. Over the decades following there were other high profile culture figures attuned to Ozu's quietly stirring dramas, no surprise then to find Roger Ebert among them, and arthouse institutions who had embraced his work, like those depicted in Richard Combs "The Poetics of Resistance" for Film Comment. No shortage of contemporary analysis, appreciation and criticism on Ozu's filmography exists in the digital age, with a small selection of highlights represented by Senses of Cinema's Great Directors feature on Ozu and the abundance of essays and releases offered on the Criterion Collection.

"Also Like Life: The Films of Hou Hsiao-Hsien" at Northwest Film Forum, Grand Illusion Cinema & Scarecrow Video: Mar 19 - Apr 7

What will likely prove to be the repertory cinema event of the year begins the third week of March with both The Grand Illusion and Northwest Film Forum presenting the touring retrospective of one of the defining voices of the Taiwanese New Wave, "Also Like Life: The Films of Hou Hsiao-Hsien". Named director of the decade in a polls conducted by Film Comment and The Village Voice at the close of the 20th Century, the Museum of the Moving Image, "Hou Hsiao-Hsien: In Search of Lost Time" and their symposium introduction still stands as the most succinct tacking of the paradox of this revered, yet rarely seen director: "It’s worth questioning, however, what Hou Hsiao-Hsien's admittedly rarefied brand of art cinema means to filmmaking and film history—even history itself —if he's not being seen anywhere but on the festival circuit. Just how can we support such grand claims for his importance, when he’s preaching to a ready choir and often empty pews? The answer is easy: wedding political filmmaking with a technique at once naturalistic and highly aestheticized, Hou Hsiao-Hsien has made films that wrestle variously, and either directly or metaphorically, with personal and national histories, the struggles between Taiwan and Chinese nationalism, the encroachment of capital on an ever-evolving way of life, and, most recently, the legacy of cinema itself. 'Essential viewing' couldn’t be more aptly applied to the works of any other living director,".

Kent Jones' chronicling of Hou's ascendency for Film Comment, from cult phenomenon to arthouse favorite and established auteur over the decade of the late 80's to 90's, "Cinema with a Roof Over its Head: Hou Hsiao-Hsien" probes the complex factors involved in how it is that a director as critically lauded as Hou Hsiao-Hsien remains largely unseen to this day. Foremost among them is that Hou's depiction of time and space conveyed through depth, color and hypnotically repeated motifs eschews being quantified through populist criteria. Even those outfitted with an understanding of the past half-Century of Asian film, where western paradigms can occasionally be applied to fill in our gaps in knowledge, in the case of Hou Hsiao-Hsien's filmmography the bridge to meaning still requires intellectual effort. A facilitative resource in bridging that expanse, the Senses of Cinema archives host a in-depth Hou Hsiao-Hsien spotlight featuring lengthy and analytic articles on the active visual minimalism of his cinema, "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s Optics of Ephemerality", his homage of sorts to Yasujiro Ozu's love of "Situations Over Stories: Café Lumière & Hou Hsiao-Hsien", the nuanced depiction of different eras through "The Complexity of Minimalism: Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s Three Times" and his intimate observations on the tribulations of modern, urban, Taiwanese women, "Hou Hsiou-Hsien’s Urban Female Youth Trilogy". The night before the series' kickoff, Scarecrow Video will be presenting a rare screening of the director's early feature "The Boys from Fengkuei" as part of their concurrently running sidebar of Hou Hsiao-Hsien's lesser known works. The film will be introduced by local critic and Asian cinema scholar Sean Gilman, and as with the rest of Scarecrow's monthly Screening Room calendar, admission is free. Considerately, memberships at both Northwest Film Forum and The Grand Illusion apply to ticket purchases at either venue for the full series.

Yasujiro Ozu & Kenji Mizoguchi with live scores by Aono Jikken Ensemble | Deco Japan: Shaping Art & Culture at Seattle Asian Art Museum: May 10 - Oct 19

Though difficult to quantify the significance of Yasujiro Ozu's contribution to film history as a whole, there are few better starting points than Mark Schilling's "Re-examining Ozu on Film" overview of the director's quietly groundbreaking cinema. What's considered by many to be Ozu's masterpiece, "Tokyo Story" was Rated #1 in the director's poll and #3 in the critic's poll in Sight & Sound's 50 Greatest Films of All Time. It's global status reinforced by Dave Thompson's Best Arthouse Films of All Time column, Peter Bradshaw's "The Quiet Master" and Ian Buruma's "Yasujiro Ozu: An Artist of the Unhurried World" for The Guardian UK. Taken alongside David Bordwell's essay for Criterion, "Tokyo Story: Compassionate Detachment" and reviews of his final films, they all go some way to describe why Ozu's poetic and personal reflections on Japanese society are regarded so highly within the canon of 20th Century cinema. Seattle's foremost meeting of Japanese traditional music and the avant-garde Aono Jikken Ensemble have a long-established relationship with Ozu from their numerous commissions accompanying Northwest Film Forum's astonishing 5 week, 27 film "Sacred Cinema: The Yasujiro Ozu Retrospective" of a decade ago. This month they return after a lengthy hiatus to perform a new musical score with benshi-style narration to Ozu's silent comedy "The Lady and The Beard" which featured some brilliant promotional graphic work at the time in the 1930's. This free live performance under the stars at the Volunteer Park Amphitheater is part of Seattle Asian Art Museum's Deco Japan: Shaping Art and Culture 1920–1945 exhibit. With another two nights of Japanese to follow, including Kenji Mizoguchi's formative story of a young woman struggling to make it in the modern world amidst familial, generational and gender concerns, "Osaka Elegy". Alongside Ozu's later color adaptation of his own comi-tragic tale of a touring theater troupe and their lives of tradition and craft in a changing world, "Floating Weeds".

Adam Sekuler's 8 Years of Programming Excellence at Northwest Film Forum

This next season sees the final Northwest Film Forum calendar curated by Adam Sekuler. Adam's arrival in Seattle as Northwest Film Forum's programming director coincided with the end of the greatest decade of film I've personally bore witness to in the cinema. A decade where friends and myself would attend some 30-40 films annually in the Seattle International Film Festival which then encompassed kaleidoscopically diverse forms, styles and natures of film. From genre movies, to Horror, Sci-Fi and Anime, to more somber Arthouse and New Global Cinema, to Documentaries and Dramas. It was one of the greatest decades the festival has seen in it's 40 year run. With it's conclusion in the mid-2000's the void was to be filled by the visionary curatorial insight of the programming at Northwest Film Forum. If there was something written in the pages of the New York Times, Village Voice, Film Comment, Sight & Sound or Cinema-Scope, it was a good bet that between SIFF, Northwest Film Forum and the then-adventurous Landmark Theatres, there would be opportunity to see it. But this isn't about the shrinking forums and context to witness cinema in our city, it's instead an overview of Northwest Film Forum's near-decade of programming excellence. Eight years in which I saw such visionary series' as Hungary's marathon-take master of rain, time and darkness "The Harmonic Resistance of Bela Tarr" and the lesser know Japanese auteur of the familial melodrama, after Ozu and Naruse, Northwest Film Forum took a "Long Take on Mizoguchi". French New Wave outsider Rivett, without whom there would be no David Lynch or Charlie Kaufman "Lighter Than Air: The Films of Jacques Rivette", groundbreaking work from the Nordic regions, "Sisu Cinema: Nine From the Finnish New Wave" and century of sci-fi from Russian, "From the Tsars to the Stars: A Journey Through Russian Fantastik Cinema". One of the film finds of my adult life, Portugal's new master of the ultra-minimal, "Still Lives: The Films of Pedro Costa", the stunningly conceived retrospective of Japanese New Wave provocateur, "A Man Vanishes: The Legacy of Shohei Imamura", and another major find, the discovery of the films and installation work of the sublime Thai visionary, "The Short Films of Apichatpong Weerasethakul". A trio by Japan's incomparable Studio Ghibli, which may have supplied my most perfect moviegoing experience to date; seeing "My Neighbor Totoro" with an audience of children in "Dream Screen: Three by Miyazaki". On the polar opposite end of the spectrum, transgressive urban tales of wayward ladies and cool Yakuza in "No Borders, No Limits: 1960s Nikkatsu Action Cinema", more French New Wave wonders unnearthed in "The Labrynthine Alain Robbe–Grillet", the humor, satire and absurdity of "Miloš Forman’s Formative Films", and another great find of the decade from South America, "At The Edge Of The World: The Cinema of Lisandro Alonso". 

From other countries in Europe we got great German New Wave, "Divided Cinema: German Cinema at The Wall", the brilliant, dark, British detective procedural "Red Riding Trilogy", the return of some the greatest of South Korea's hyperviolent cinema with "Pan Chan-Wook's Vengeance Trilogy". There was more greatness from Portugal with "The Portuguese Melodies of Miguel Gomes", and stunning documentaries from one of South America's greats in "Patricio Guzman’s Chile". Not many would conceive to program a series highlighting "New York Noise: Tales From the No Wave", and wondrous Czech absurdity, decadence and surrealism of "Jan Svankmajer: The Surreal Puppet Poet". Memorable times sitting in the dark of the Film Forum include the astonishing power of the Globalization Trilogy by Michael Glawogger including "Workingman's Death", "Megacities" and "Whore's Glory", with the director presenting the films in attendance, almost moving me to tears with his daring, passion, generosity and insight. The atmospheric, sociopolitical dramas of Turkey's Nuri Bilge Ceylan were also a discovery, both his masterpiece "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia", and my personal introduction to his cinema with "Climates" seven years before. Other notable political programming depicted the ongoing battle between Iran's independent cinema and the results of the 2009 election, explicitly Jafar Panahi's "This is Not a Film". There was also more ridiculous meta-fare to be had with Guy Maddin's pastiche of silent and early cinema, his theatrical, absurd, grandiose, "Brand Upon the Brain" screened on the massive Cinerama screen with live symphony and Maddin himself as the evening's orator. We also saw French visionnaire Claire Denis' finest film of her career to-date, "35 Shots of Rum" along with other modern wonders from central Europe, Ulrich Seidl's brutal, humanistic, "Import/Export". The world-over was represented in Carlos Reygadas' rapturous, transcendental "Silent Light", Steve McQueen's directorial debut, "Hunger" and Kiyoshi Kurosawa's move into familial psychodrama with "Tokyo Sonata". We also saw the return of what may be China's greatest living filmmaker, in Jia Zhang-Ke's "24 City", the extended roadshow cut of Olivier Assayas' "Carlos" and Gaspar Noe's redefining of the technical scope of cinema itself with "Enter the Void".

After introducing me to his films back in 2005, with the mesmerizing fugue of "Tropical Malady", Northwest Film Forum was the one theater in town with the prescience to program Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Palme d'Or winning "Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives". They were also the theater in town with the insight to know a W.G. Sebald "Rings of Saturn" documentary would find an audience, Grant Gee's "Patience (After Sebald)". Again they thought to book a return to the romantic postmodern lushness of Miguel Gomes' cinema with "Tabu". Yet more groundbreaking programming followed with the sensorial onslaught of Harvard Sensory Ethnography Lab's Véréna Paravel & Lucien Castaing-Taylor's "Leviathan" and their touching, intimate, "People's Park", both of which had their Seattle premier at Northwest Film Forum. Film Forum also had the insight to program Peter Strickland's hauntological genre homage "Berberian Sound Studio", Carlos Reygadas' return with his otherworldly and divisive "Post Tenebras Lux", and an extended retrospective of the heartbreaking, existential, magical-realist film of the Polish auteur, "Krzysztof Kieslowski: Revelations of the Human Soul". Great genre series were also had, like a summer of Samurai Cinema featuring Masaki Kobayashi, Hideo Gosha, Hiroshi Inagaki and Kihachi Okamoto "A Man, A Blade, An Empty Road". Striking one-offs included the most poetic and hauntingly original directorial debut I'd seen that decade, Lucile Hadzihalilovic's "Innocence". We also got a rare near-comprehensive overview of the work of my personal favorite of the Japanese post-War directors. His humanistic everyday depiction of modern life was my gateway into the Japanese film of the era, inspired in no small way by "The Enduring Cinema of Mikio Naruse". And last but not least, the occasion of my fifth viewing of what's considered one of the greatest films of all-time, Yasujiro Ozu's "Tokyo Story". These all only touching on some of Adam's insight, faith in his prospective audience, and vision as a curator. His time at the Northwest Film Forum has been a true urban, community-enhancing gift to us all over the course of these 8 years. I wish him the best in his European endeavors. Personally, professionally, culturally, his presence in our city will be missed.

Yasujiro Ozu + Sound Art = Hitokomakura

Rare it is to see a compilation of music dedicated to a director of this cultural and historic significance.
Even more rare that the work on said compilation would not only involve artists with a degree of genuine
familiarity to the directors work, but who understand the aesthetic character and cultural, political and
historical value of the filmmakers oeuvre as well. And possibly most importantly, how to translate those
qualities to corresponding sonic and compositional values (meaning in this case, yes, there is much
delicacy of touch and 'silence' to be had throughout).... So here is a rare thing indeed!:

Link to and/OAR 'Hitokomakura' Site

On "Hitokomakura" and/OAR not only bring together a quality roster of minimalist composers and sound-artists
(mostly working in the electronic field, along with some subtle electro-acoustic work and field recordings)
but also presents the collection with an understanding of Ozu's significance in the canon of cinema in a
manner that compliments his elegance, refined subtlety and deftness of visual touch. Further reaffirmed
by the involvement of Criterion Collection supplying the accompanying visual element, both in the sleeve-art
as well as the corresponding downloadable PDF documents - giving this whole project an even greater stamp
of authenticity.

Man, am I ever surprised and appreciative when these kind of things are 'done right'. Case in point being
this beautifully conceived and executed sonic tribute to Ozu's art . Exceptional in many senses of the word.

From the and/OAR site:

"This release turns its focus upon Yasujiro Ozu's use of "pillow shots" (i.e. short poetic pauses that appear
between the acting segments of his films. The term "pillow shot" was not coined by Ozu himself, but
several years after his passing in the early 1960s by a Japanese journalist who was trying to draw a
comparison of the intermediate scenes to "pillow words" found in traditional Japanese poetry.
This is a double CD release with both CDs featuring audio plus a cross-platform compatible
PDF booklet containing pillow shots (courtesy of Criterion Collection) and liner notes.

Each artist who appears on this release was asked to choose one or more "pillow shots" to use as inspiration
for their pieces. A link to web pages containing a large assortment of pillow shots" was provided, and
accordingly, the pillow shots were reserved on a first come, first served basis. The artists also watched
the films from which the pillow shots came from in order to get a sense of how their chosen pillow shots
were employed by Ozu.

The sound work featured represents a wide range of artistic approaches, but as always with these projects,
the artists were chosen specifically, based on their previous work and on how it might contribute to the
collective whole of each project."

Featured artists include:

ALEJANDRA & AERON
AONO JIKKEN ENSEMBLE
ASUNA
MARC BEHRENS
KEITH BERRY
LAWRENCE ENGLISH
HERIBERT FRIEDL
BERNHARD GUNTER
HACO
JOHN HUDAK
JASON KAHN
HITOSHI KOJO
KOURA
DALE LLOYD
YOSHIO MACHIDA
ROEL MEELKOP
KIYOSHI MIZUTANI
DEAN MOORE (with Michael Shannon)
STEVE RODEN
SAWAKO
MICHAEL SHANNON
STEINBRUCHEL
TAKU SUGIMOTO
SUKORA
TOSHIYA TSUNODA

Text by Doug Cummings (Masters Of Cinema and Filmjourney.org)
and Dale Lloyd (and/OAR).

Northwest Film Forum - 'Super Hits' Sept 23 - Oct 2 + More!

..

Northwest Film Forum celebrates 10 years of great cinema!

Northwest Film Forum Site


... and a film roster this month that includes Bresson, Matthew Barney,
Yasujiro Ozu, Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Kaurismaki and Kaneto Shindo... to name a few.

I plan to catch a bunch of these.

Hou Hsiao-Hsien/ Hiroshi Teshigahara + Art overload

Some good films and musics things. The most recent Hou Hsiao-Hsien "Cafe Lumiere" is pretty nice - its actually a homage to Yasujiro Ozu and is loosely modeled after his "Tokyo Story" and stars Tadanobu Asano. I saw it last night and was surprised how 'pop' is was compared to his other films - but still quite good. Speaking of Hou, I have a copy of the soundtrack to his film "Flowers of Shanghai" which to my surprise is done by crazy-prolific japanese electronic mastermind Yoshihiro Hanno as well as the new Progressive Form comp "Mixform" which is supergreat minimal japanese electronics in a fluidly constructed mix by Haruomi Hosono . More films : I'm really looking forward to the new Michael Haneke film (Piano Teacher/Hour of the Wolf) - titled "Cache" - it got amazing reviews at Cannes as well as the new Tsai Ming-Liang (Goodbye, Dragon Inn/What Time is it There) who's new film "Wayward Cloud" also looks supegreat - the review in Sight & Sound Magazine called it a 'porno-musical about drought and watermelons' (!!) and the new film by Apichatpong Weerasethakul titled "Tropical Malady" - it was nominated for the Jurry Prize at Cannes and is playing here at the Northwest Film Forum next month. -And- the Hiroshi Teshigahara film adaptations of Kobo Abe's novels "Woman in the Dunes", "Face of Another", "Pitfall", "Man Without a Map" / "Ruined Map" have all been released with superior transfers by Eureka! films UK on DVD. Oy, I'm kinda almost overloaded. I need an external secondary brain please.

Yasujiro Ozu Retrospective - NWFF : Feb 4 - Mar 10

From the Northwest Film Forum site:

"There is perhaps no body of film work held as universally sacred as that of Yasujiro Ozu. The influence of Ozu's poignant, heartfelt filmmaking is still felt today, cited as a major inspiration by such disparate filmmakers as Claire Denis, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Lindsay Anderson, Wim Wenders, Jim Jarmusch, Aki Kaurismaki, Abbas Kiarostami and Paul Schrader. Northwest Film Forum is truly honored to be presenting a retrospective of the master's existing work."

One Month - 27 Films!

http://www.nwfilmforum.org/ozu/