Chie Arai

Movies

Hearts Know * the Runaway Brides
Nineteen brides, scattered over four continents, run off on their wedding day. Reality and fiction merge when random people from different cultures contemplate why the brides run away.
Franz Kafka's a Country Doctor
Animation
A hapless country doctor describes with breathless urgency a night-time summons to attend a young patient. Events soon take on a surreal aspect as "unearthly horses" transport him instantaneously to the bedside. The doctor, preoccupied with personal distractions and grievances against those he is employed to care for, fails to find what is revealed to be a vile, fatal wound. He is humiliated by the villagers, who are "always expecting the impossible from the doctor," and doomed to an endless return trip, losing everything.
Mount Head
Animation
A miserly man eats the pits of some cherries he can't stand throwing out. A tree starts growing from the top of his head. He cuts it off; it grows back. After a while, he gives up and lets it grow, but the crowds that gather on top of his head to enjoy the tree (and leave huge mounds of trash) eventually drive him to uproot the tree. This leaves a crater on top of his head, which fills with water, which becomes a popular lake.