Category: 15th Japanese Film Festival

The third day of the Japanese Film Festival was attacked from all sides, but featured two stalwarts of the nation’s cinematic output: the weepy dog story and the sugary tale of a pattissier in the making, more commonly recognised as “the chef’s journey”.

Star Watching Dog

Japanese films have a tendency of making up Japanese folklore where they feel necessary. Does the star watching dog exist? The idea goes that dogs watch the stars, not knowing they can never reach them. Therefore, they always aim for the top.

Japanese dogs never banked on Laika.

The second day of the Japanese Film Festival was a bumpy ride, with one of the films essentially fizzling and dying before my eyes and the other providing solid laughter but not much in the way of substance. It’s a tough life at the festival.

Princess Toyotomi

At first I thought that Princess Toyotomi simply didn’t translate, but as it progressed it became increasingly clear that the film I was watching was simply incoherent, and more than a little bit stupid. Realising that a film’s lack of quality is not a failing on your own part is a great source of relief, because it’s near impossible to describe Princess Toyotomi as anything approaching a good movie.