Yoshiko Hashimoto

자연이 풍족한 가고시마현의 나가시마마치. 섬의 특산물인 방어의 양식업을 부부로 하는 히노 사츠키(야마다 마호)는 생후부터 길러왔던 7세의 토요카즈와 특별 입양 신청을 앞두고 있어 드디어 토요카즈와 진짜 가족이 될 수 있다는 것에 감회가 새로웠다. 한편 섬에는 1년 전에 나타나 식당에서 일하게 된 사토오 아카네(칸지야 시호리)라는 여성이 있었다. 어느 날, 발걸음을 잡을 수 없었던 토요카즈를 낳은 부모의 소재를 알게 된다.

The greatest taboo of the Battle of Okinawa were Guerrilla units composed of boy soldiers. Until now, not even the Japanese people knew the full scope of these secret troops, and survivors have been afraid to share their tragic details. Okinawa became the bulwark to protect the Japanese mainland toward the end of World War II. After the Americans landed, a violent battle ensued resulting in the loss of over 200,000 lives – many of them civilian. This documentary uncovers Japan’s deepest secrets concerning the Battle of Okinawa, and also sounds alarms about modern Japan’s recent steps toward remilitarization.

Documentary on Okinawan resistance to American and SDF base construction

Born to atomic bomb survivors in Hiroshima, Mamoru Samuragochi, a self-taught classical composer with a degenerative condition causing deafness, was celebrated as a "Japanese Beethoven" for the digital age. However, just prior to the 2014 Winter Olympics, where Samuragochi's "Sonatina for Violin" was to accompany figure skater Daisuke Takahashi, part-time university lecturer Takashi Niigaki revealed that he had served as the composer's ghostwriter for 18 years, that Samuragochi couldn't notate music and, in fact, could hear perfectly. As Samuragochi's recordings were pulled and performances cancelled, Niigaki enjoyed success on TV talk shows. Filmmaker Tatsuya Mori finds Samuragochi in his small Yokohama apartment with his wife and cat, ready to tell his side of the story. A mesmerizing character study skewering media duplicity and constructions of ability/disability, in which Samuragochi's career has collapsed, taking fact and fiction with it.

Documentary on photojournalist Ryuichi Hirokawa

An elderly woman named Fumiko lived through the battle of Okinawa. Now she is part of the movement protesting the construction of a new American military base in Henoko. This film captures the complex feelings of those who have had to live their lives alongside military bases. It compels us to share in their yearning to bring an end to this battle.

Many people have forgotten what happened in Fukushima.

Fukushima's Minami-soma has a ten-centuries-long tradition of holding the Soma Nomaoi ("chasing wild horses") festival to celebrate the horse's great contribution to human society. Following the meltdown of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in the wake of the March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami, local people were forced to flee the area. Rancher Shinichiro Tanaka returned to find his horses dead or starving, and refused to obey the government's orders to kill them. While many racehorses are slaughtered for horsemeat, his horses had been subjected to radiation and were inedible. Yoju Matsubayashi, whose "Fukushima: Memories of the Lost Landscape" is one of the most impressive documentaries made immediately after the disaster, spent the summer of 2011 helping Tanaka take care of his horses. In documenting their rehabilitation, he has produced a profound meditation on these animals who live as testaments to the tragic bargain human society made with nuclear power.

Documentary on photojournalist Kikujiro Fukushima

After the 11 March 2011 tsunami and nuclear disaster, residents of Futaba, a town in Fukushima Prefecture, are relocated to an abandoned high school in a suburb of Tokyo, 150 miles south. With a clear and compassionate eye, filmmaker Atsushi Funahashi follows the displaced people as they struggle to adapt to their new environment. Among the vivid personalities who emerge are the town mayor, a Moses without a Promised Land; and a farmer who would rather defy the government than abandon his cows to certain starvation.