Press Release May 23, 2014

Pink is back! Six Days of Japan in Frankfurt
Opening of the 14th Nippon Connection Film Festival

May 27 – June 1, 2014, Frankfurt am Main

On Tuesday, May 27, the 14th Japanese Film Festival Nippon Connection will start. For six days, Nippon Connection brings together cinephiles and fans of Japanese culture from all over Germany and Europe in Frankfurt am Main. This year, the film festival will take place for the second time at Künstlerhaus Mousonturm and Naxoshalle. Touching dramas, entertaining comedies or unique documentaries: the biggest festival for Japanese film worldwide presents a multi-faceted film program with more than 100 brand new short and feature films. More than 70 filmmakers and artists from Japan will present their works in person. A rich accompanying cultural program with 52 events invites young and old to experience and enjoy Japan.

The festival will open at Mousonturm on Tuesday, May 27 at 7:30 p.m. with the comedy Fuku-chan of Fukufuku Flats by Yosuke Fujita. The protagonist, chubby and warm-hearted bachelor Fuku-chan, feels a bit lonely behind his cheerful facade. One day a former school mate comes to apologize for a trick she once played on him. A German-British-Italian-Taiwanese-Japanese co-production, the film tells a spirited story about loneliness, fear, happiness and forgiving. The director and the producers will attend the screening. At 10:30 p.m. genre fans will regale themselves with cult director Takashi Miike's Lesson of the Evil, in which a popular high school teacher shows his true face.

The “Nippon Visions” section with independent and innovative film productions will kick off at Naxoshalle on Tuesday, May 27 at 8:00 p.m. with the documentary film The Horses of Fukushima by Yoju Matsubayashi. In Minamisoma, located within the 20-km radius around the nuclear power plant Fukushima Daiichi, there is an annual traditional festival honouring the horses from the region. And horse meat is also considered a delicacy in Japanese cuisine. In an ironic yet sensitive way, the film depicts the fate of those horses that have become a risk to both purposes due to their radiation exposure. Another documentary feature will follow at 10:15 p.m.: Tale of a Butcher Shop by Aya Hanabusa shows the daily life of a Japanese butcher family, partly in very graphic scenes.

The traditional opening lounge provides the perfect setting for a relaxed start into the festival marathon. Starting at 8:00 p.m. at the Mousonturm Café, DJ Mystery will deliver the right summer beats. At 9:00 p.m., a spectacular sword fighting show with Kaori Kawabuchi awaits the visitors at Studio 1. After that, you can sing your heart out at the karaoke bar, where Japanese noodle soup, sushi and the popular Japanese frozen beer will fulfill all culinary wishes.

The second day of the festival, Wednesday, May 28, will start at 2:30 p.m. with Hitoshi One's Be My Baby. This independent film lets you delve into the world of Japanese twenty-somethings and their perplexing love lives. At 5:30 p.m. Shinobu Yaguchi's comedy Robo-G presents you the hilarious story of three washing machine engineers turned robot inventors. After an apparent failure, one resolute retiree enters a robot exhibition dressed in a bizarre costume. The documentary Kesennuma, Voices. 3 by star director Yukihiko Tsutsumi, usually known for his blockbuster films, is dedicated to the town of Kesennuma, which was severely hit by the tsunami in 2011. At 8:00 p.m. the film will have its international premiere in the presence of the director and members of the production crew.

On Wednesday, May 28, at 3:00 p.m., the “Nippon Culture” program invites you to a presentation organized by the Institute of Japanese Studies at Frankfurt University on the life and work of Yo Henmi (born in 1944), author, journalist and a tireless media rebel, fighting against a policy of silence and cover-ups. This will be followed by a kimono workshop at 6:00 p.m. and the opening of the photography exhibition Tokyo 24-70mm at Ausstellungsraum Eulengasse, where photographer and journalist Natascha Pflaumbaum will present her urban portraits from the streets of Tokyo. At 8:00 p.m., we have a special treat for all lovers of sophisticated B-movies: this year's Nippon Home Cinema features Wenzel Storch, “Germany's best director” (according to the magazine “Titanic”), and film journalist Heiko Hanel, accompanying a gem of Japanese film history with their commentary. As always, the title of the film remains top secret until the screening.

The Japanese Film Festival Nippon Connection is honored by the patronage of Peter Feldmann, Mayor of the city of Frankfurt am Main, and Hideyuki Sakamoto, Consul General of Japan in Frankfurt am Main. It is organized on a voluntary basis by the 70-member team of the non-profit Nippon Connection. Again, the festival expects around 16,000 visitors.

Locations
Künstlerhaus Mousonturm, Waldschmidtstr. 4, Frankfurt am Main (festival center)
Naxoshalle, Waldschmidtstr. 19, Frankfurt am Main (festival center)
German Film Museum, Schaumainkai 41, Frankfurt am Main
Mal Seh’n Kino, Adlerflychtstraße 6, Frankfurt am Main
Ausstellungsraum Eulengasse, Seckbacher Landstr. 16, Frankfurt-Bornheim (exhibition)

Tickets
Tickets are available at all ADticket sales agencies in Germany as well as on the internet:
www.nipponconnection.com, www.adticket.de
Ticket hotline: 0180 6050400 (24 hrs a day, 20 cents per call from German landline, max. 60 cents per call from mobile networks)