Katsuyuki Koana

Movies

Waiting in the Dark
Producer
Michiru has lost her eyesight, and to make matters worse, her father dies shortly afterwards. She is now all alone and spends most of her day isolated in her home. Akihiro is a Chinese-Japanese immigrant, that has had to deal with racism all throughout his life. He is now tormented at work by one of his older co-workers named Toshio. One day at a train station in front of Michiru's house, Toshio is thrown into the path of an oncoming train. The only person seen at the train stop was Akihiro. Akihiro frantically flees from the scene and manages to enter Michiru's house without her knowledge. After a few days, Michiru starts to sense the presence of another person in her home.
A Blue Automobile
Producer
Aoi Kuruma (A Blue Automobile) focuses on such a character - a part-time DJ and record-store employee named Richio (Arata). With his spiky yellow hair, wrap-around shades and pale mask of a face, Richio would seem to be an icy moon circling the distant planet of his own regard. But as Okuhara shows us from the first scene, Richio has been traumatized by a boyhood horror - and still bears the physical scars on one eye, the emotional scars in dreams and visions he can neither escape nor explain away. The sunglasses and mask are there for a reason, the pain and rage are real. At the same time, he has a straightforwardness that verges on the cruel - but this is also one of his most appealing qualities.