Opening and closing night film of 2012 Shinsedai Cinema Festival announced!
Sunday, March 18, 2012
by Chris MaGee I have to admit that since last weekend I have been swimming in work... or maybe treading water in work is more accurate. This mostly has to do with my work organizing the 4th Shinsedai Cinema Festival happening here in Toronto at The Revue Cinema, July 12th to 15th. It was last weekend that the fest held a special screening and fundraising charity raffle, and it was during the night that we announced both the opening night film and the closing night film of the 2012 film fest.
Shinsedai 2012 will open with Yu Irie's rock comedy/ drama "Ringing in Their Ears" (above). The film centers around real life indie rock band Shinsei Kamattechan and their transition from underground group to major label commodity. Around this struggle Irie, director of "8000 Miles", weaves the stories of a group of the bad's most loyal fans: a young boy obsessed with its lead singer, his mother who works part-time as an exotic pole dancer, and a young high school girl who is attempting to become a professional shogi (Japanese chess) player. "Ringing in Their Ears" will open the fest on July 12th at 7:00PM.
Closing the fest is a film that just in the few days since we announced it is already gaining some serious buzz in the city. That would be Masafumi Yamada's surreal and blackly comic "Tentsuki". The film tells the story of a man who is on the run from a pair of yakuza thugs. He ends up hiding out in a back alley neighbourhood in Kyoto that doesn't appear on any of the city maps. Here he encounters a cast of very quirky characters, including a security guard who collects strange fossils, an insane widow and a beautiful alcoholic who believes she is growing a pair of wings on her back. You can check out the trailer for "Tentsuki" below. Suffice to say that if you love the films of David Lynch or the stranger films of Takashi Miike you'll love this one.
The 4th annual Shinsedai Cinema Festival will be taking place at Toronto's Revue Cinema this July! We'll be announcing our next block of films on April 16th, so keep checking the fest's official website here.