[KineJapan] LITTLE ADVENTURES 1978?

[Jasper Sharp]

The Japanese title is Hashire tomato Nippon ōdan 300-kiro, which translates as Run Tomato: 300km Across Japan.
I've talked a bit about this person before on one of the commentary's for 88 Films' Roman Porno releases -not pinku eiga, which is independent erotic films produced outside of major studios like Nikkatsu.
It seems he was just a regular contracted staff member who worked as an AD for most of his career, beginning on Shohei Imamura's Profound Desire of the Gods, but mostly on later classic Roman Porno including Night of the Felines and Playful White Fingers, but with a filmog that reminds one that Nikkatsu didnt just make Roman Porno films across the 1970s- there's Koretsugu Kurahara's bizarre cross-Middle Eastern road movie Sunrise, Sunset, but also the two films he directed were for Nikkatsu's children's film arm. This is an aspect of Nikkatsu few people remember and definitely worth further research - I remember seeing one of these films on Youtube, Friends/Tomodachi, and it featuring a very young Yusaku Matsuda prior to him becoming famous.



The Creeping Garden<http://www.creepinggarden.com/> - A Real-Life Science-Fiction Story about Slime Moulds and the People Who Work With them, directed by Tim Grabham and Jasper Sharp.
Available now on Dual-Format Blu-ray/DVD from Arrow Films<https://arrowfilms.com/product-detail/the-creeping-garden-dual-format/FCD1435>.
The book, The Creeping Garden: Irrational Encounters with Plasmodial Slime Moulds is out now from Alchimia Publishing<http://www.alchimiapublishing.com/creeping-garden/>.
"A surprising investigation of perception, thought and life itself", Nicolas Rapold, The New York Times<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/30/movies/review-the-creeping-garden-on-the-wonders-of-the-slime-mold.html>.
"An out-of-left-field nerdy delight", John DeFore, Hollywood Reporter<https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/creeping-garden-fantasia-review-724416>.
"Strange, eccentric, diverting", Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian<https://www.theguardian.com/film/2017/mar/09/creeping-garden-review-slime-mould-film>.

________________________________
From: KineJapan <kinejapan-bounces at mailman.yale.edu> on behalf of quentin turnour via KineJapan <kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu>
Sent: 26 August 2025 23:38
To: Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum <kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu>
Cc: quentin turnour <unkleque at yahoo.com.au>
Subject: [KineJapan] LITTLE ADVENTURES 1978?

Just checking with the Kine Japan collective to see if anyone here would be able to confirm the original title of a c.1978 Japanese live action children's film, sometimes titled in English LITTLE ADVENTURES.

I have the following English information about the feature, but not a studio. I also cannot find any reference to the film in English language dbs (although imdb can be a thicket) or the Japanese sources I can access, such as JFDB.

I think it's possibly this: https://www.nikkatsu.com/movie/25621.html. But the literal translation of the title is so different, and director Okamoto's career seems largely as an assistant on pinko eiga, not per the synopsis.

"Synopsis: A story of a group of school children on a bicycle trip from Tokyo to the Sea of Japan and their adventure en route.

" Director: Mr. Koji Okamoto

" Leading Actress: Miss Emi Kushida

" Leading Actor: Mr. Hidekauzu Takei

" Supporting…   Miss Midori Takei… Mr Makota Okamoto

Thanks in advance.

Quentin Turnour, National Archives of Australia.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.yale.edu/pipermail/kinejapan/attachments/20250827/a954534b/attachment-0001.html>