Cologne Cineasia Festival

[Roland Domenig]

Juergen briefly mentioned the Cologne festival last week. Here a more
detailed report on the festival:


The fact that Cologne's Cineasia/Japanorama Film Festival was (after last
years Nippon Connection Festival in Frankfurt) the second German film
festival dedicated to the Japanese cinema reflects the heightening interest
in Japanese cinema in Germany. Though the idea for an Asian film festival in
Cologne was not new, Helmut and his team had only half a year to organize
the festival and I have to congratulate them for the fine job they've done.

To put a focus on Japanese cinema was for two reasons a wise choice. First,
because the recent success of some Japanese films (e.g. the Kitano films,
Samurai Fiction, Welcome back Mr. McDonald) together with the general influx
of Japanese pop culture has triggered a new awareness of Japanese movies in
the German speaking countries, and secondly because Cologne is home ground
of the Japan Foundation in Germany and without their support a festival of
this scale wouldn't have been possible.

Another wise decision was the choice of films. The focus was on popular
cinema and entertainment (Miike, Sabu, action/horror/splatter) without
neglecting what many refer to as arthouse cinema (Eureka, Barren Illusion,
Sunflower). Most of the films were shown for the first time in Germany, some
of them were international premieres. A clear favorite of the organizers and
the audiences was Miike Takashi who was represented with 4 films, The Guys
from Paradise, The City of Lost Souls aka Hazard City, Salaryman Kintaro and
Visitor Q. The last one a highly controversial and shocking film which in
Japan might cause as much debates as Battle Royal had it given a wider
distribution and not the small-scale release in Shimokitazawa. During
Visitor Q one could literally hear the spectators holding their breath. Not
so with the other Miike films, though. The audience laughed heartily and
seemingly enjoyed them. This was also true with Tsutsumi Yukihiko's Keizoku,
the sequel to the popular TV-series that created a furor last year. The
people didn't mind that the story was sometimes difficult to follow if you
don't know the TV-series, but enjoyed the weird story as much as Tsutsumi,
who briefly came to the festival, the spontaneous reaction of the audience.
    
The hit of the festival was clearly Kitamura Ryuhei's Versus, that was shown
as German premiere. Versus is a high-speed Horror film with
Zombie/Splatter/Kung Fu/Mystery-elements put together to a very wild mixture
of genres. Though the film has some very disgusting scenes, the imagery is
remarkable and the camerawork and editing superb. Kitamura, who together
with four of his leading actors attended the festival, told that the total
budget of the film was merely 400.000 Dollar and that they used only one
camera. To avoid costs for expensive sets the film was shot in a forest in
Chiba prefecture, supposed to be the door to resurrection. Versus will be
released in Japan this summer and has opened Kitamura not only the door to
resurrection but also the doors to another holy wood in California. Gerald
Green, producer of Platoon, Salvador or Lost in Africa, has hired Kitamura
as director for The Pirates of Tarutao about a prisoner-island in Thailand
during WW II. Shooting starts in September.

Every festival is confronted with unexpected problems and Cologne is no
exception. One was a defect in the air-conditioning system during the first
Versus screening when the British Council cinema was most crowded. This
turned out as not so bad, however, because it gave you an even more sensual
feeling of the living hell unfolding on screen. The problems didn't stop
there. A Scene at the Sea didn't arrive in time and Zeze Takahisa's Rush!
had to be cancelled because the English subtitles haven't been ready. Then
the subtitle-projector broke down and Love and Pop and Noisy Requiem had to
be shown without subtitles. This all usually causes protests and
irritations. Not so in Cologne where the audience stayed on even without
subtitles, enjoyed the films, waited patiently for a broken film to be
continued and nobody complained. A truly great audience! The staff of the
festival also didn't loose their good mood but demonstrated a high degree of
flexibility. 

One of the best things of the Cologne festival was the spacious and very
cosy lounge in the Filmhaus, the smaller of the two cinemas that became the
center of the festival. There you could relax between films, eat instant
ramen or sushi, enjoy music, meet friends, discuss the films with other
enthusiasts, talk to the guests from Japan (Mochizuki Rokuro  and Matsui
Yoshihiko were also there) or make business (Rapid Eye Movies, the Asian
film distributor based in Cologne, made a deal with Matsui about his Noisy
Requiem).    

The general response to the festival was a very good one indeed. The
audience clearly enjoyed the films (most films were sold out) and I hope
that the success of the festival will incite Helmut and his team to continue
with the festival next year. I'm certainly looking forward to the next
Cineasia festival in Cologne.



    Roland Domenig
    Institute for Japanese Studies
    University of Vienna
    AAKH-Campus, Spitalgasse 2-4
    A-1090 Wien, Austria
    Tel: +43-1-4277-43817
    Fax: +43-1-4277-9438
    roland.domenig at univie.ac.at