The 8th annual Boston Asian American Film Festival runs from October 20th to 23rd. This year's festival has films from a Japanese American filmmaker, a
Japanese-Brazilian filmmaker, a Japanese animator, and a film about a
local Japanese American mental health activist. Check out the other films here.
I'm really excited that Emerson College alum Matthew Hashiguchi's film Good Luck Soup will be screened for free at BAAFF! The film is being co-presented with Emerson's Bright Lights Series. Good Luck Soup is a transmedia documentary. Check out the film's interactive site. This is Matthew's second film at BAAFF. People Aren't All Bad with Yutaka Kobayashi was in the 2012 Shorts Program.
Directed by Matthew Hashiguchi 2016 | 70 mins | USA | Documentary
After
years of rejecting his Japanese heritage, filmmaker Matthew Hashiguchi
sets out on a humorous yet insightful journey to discover if his joyful
grandmother and other family members also struggled with their Japanese
American identities, just as he did while growing up in a predominantly
white neighborhood in the Midwest. Along the way, Matthew uncovers the
family’s decades-long struggle to assimilate into the Midwest and
obtains insightful, yet humorous wisdom from his grandmother on how she
overcame racial adversity after leaving the WWII Japanese American
Internment Camps.
Leandro Tadashi, a Japanese-Brazilian filmmaker, filmed Bá in Brazil. The full film can be seen on Vimeo (click the blue "CC" for subtitles in English, Japanese, Spanish, French and Portuguese!). I emailed with Leandro and learned that his grandmother, Yuriko Miamoto Shimata, plays Bruno's Bá. She also starred in his 2011 short Oyasuminasai. Unfortunately, Leandro won't be able to make it for the Q&A.
Bá
Written & directed by Leandro Tadashi 2015 | 14 mins | Brazil | Drama
Tells the story of a little Japanese-Brazilian boy named Bruno,
whose life is turned upside down when his "Bá" (from Bāchan, grandma in
Japanese) is brought to live in his house.
Pata
Directed by Kathryn Klingle
2016 | USA | 9 mins | Documentary
"Pata" explores what role chronic depression has played in the life of Pata Suyemoto--teacher, artist, mental health activist.
Asian CineVision has an interesting interview with Masayuki Kusaka, the producer of Harry on the Clouds. The film was originally produced as a music video for the Japanese band, RAM WIRE, with the title 僕らの手には何もないけど (Bokura no te ni wa nani mo naikedo) "Although there is nothing in our hands". They changed the soundtrack and sent it off to film festivals around the world. [Special thanks to Sachiko T for translation help!]
Harry on the Clouds
Directed by Aya Shiroi (城井文)
2016 | Japan | 4 mins | Drama (Animated)
Mother sheep can't wake up because Harry was gone. But Harry is looking his mother from the clouds.
See trailers for 16 films in this year's festival:
Directed by Shirley Kazuyo Muramoto-Wong
2014 | 56 mins | Documentary
“Hidden Legacy: Japanese Traditional Performing Arts in the World War
II Internment Camps” is the full title of this documentary, using
historical footage and interviews from artists who were interned to tell
the story of how traditional Japanese cultural arts were maintained at a
time when the War Relocation Authority (WRA) emphasized the importance
of assimilation and Americanization. Various essays and studies
concerning the camps have been published, but have focused on the
political and legal aspects of the internment, while hardly mentioning
cultural and recreational activities in the camps. When cultural and
recreational activities have been documented, they have focused on
American culture, such as baseball and swing music. This film will be
the first major presentation of the existence of traditional music,
dance and drama in the camps. It is possible only because Shirley
Kazuyo Muramoto-Wong has been searching, researching and collecting for
over 20 years information on who these artists were. She has collected
interviews, oral and visual histories, as well as artifacts from the
internees and relatives of internees, including teachers, students, the
performers, and the incredible artists who made instruments, costumes,
and the props needed for a full performance from scraps of wood,
toothbrush handles, gunny sacks, paint, and whatever they could scrape
up. Her own family’s history with the camps led her to become a kotoist
and teacher of the Japanese koto (13-stringed zither).
Very little is known of the existence of traditional Japanese
performance arts in the camps. The artists Muramoto-Wong has
interviewed are all Americans, all born here, but practiced Japanese
arts before the war, during, and after the war, because they loved the
art. This made them “social activists” in their own quiet way,
continuing the music and dance they loved, helping others to learn and
enjoy these arts, and to help draw their attention away from their
surroundings, giving them pride and self-esteem. Their efforts kept
Japanese cultural arts alive in our communities today.
We have interviewed 30 artists in the fields of music (koto, nagauta
shamisen, shakuhachi, shigin, biwa), dance (buyo, obon) and drama
(kabuki) who were interned at Tule Lake, Manzanar, Amache/Granada,
Rohwer, Gila River, and Topaz. We have interviewed Prof. Minako Waseda
of Geijutsu Daigaku University of Music and Arts, and Kunitachi College
of Music, both universities in Tokyo, whose research thesis,
Extraordinary Circumstances, Exceptional Practices: Music in Japanese
American Concentration Camps, had written the only scholarly work that
had been published on this subject. We are also interviewing students
of these arts in America, some who learned from these artists, and some
who are carrying on the tradition in our communities today, and some who
have taken this knowledge, and expanded creatively and artistically in
various imaginative ways.
Film locations include camps at Manzanar, Tule Lake, Heart Mountain;
locations in Japan, such as Osaka, Kyoto, 3 Tokyo music universities
(Tokyo Ongaku Daigaku, Geijutsu Daigaku, Kunitachi College of Music);
Cherry Blossom Festivals in San Francisco and Cupertino; San Jose Obon
Festival; Chidori Band 59th Anniversary Concert; Japanese American
Museum of San Jose; dance studio of Bando Misayasu (aka Mary Arii Mah),
and koto studio of Shirley Kazuyo Muramoto-Wong.
Event Information
Film screening followed by Q&A with creative director Shirley Kazuyo Muramoto-Wong and
actress Takayo Fischer with koto performance by Shirley Kazuyo Muramoto-Wong.
Date & Time
Monday, October 24, 2016
3:00 - 6:00pm
Location
UMass Boston
McCormack Hall, Ryan Lounge, Room M-3-721 (3rd floor)
Dorchester, MA 02125
Morrissey Satellite Lot (75 Morrissey Boulevard) Herb Chambers
property next to the Boston Globe building
St. Christopher’s Church across from the Bayside Lot
Admission
Free
Date & Time
Wednesday, October 26, 2016
7:00 - 9:00pm
Location
Wellesley College
Acorns House (building not on map - head toward the lake, pass Clapp Library and Acorns House is to the right of Harambee House)
106 Central Street
Wellesley, MA 02481
Date & Time
Thursday, October 27, 2016
6:30 - 8:30pm
Location
Brandeis University
Mandel Center for the Humanities, Room G12
415 South Street
Waltham, MA 02453
Directions/Parking
After 5pm visitors may park anywhere. Tower Lot is closest to the Mandel Center.
Admission
Free
Special thanks to Kimi Maeda for making the introductions that allowed us to get Hidden Legacy screened at Brandeis!
About the Creative Director
Shirley Kazuyo
Muramoto-Wong was raised in a musical family whose roots lie in the Chikushi
Kai School of kotoists in Japan. Her mother is a respected head of
the Chikushi Kai in the Bay Area, with close ties to her teachers in
Japan. Shirley was taught within that tradition, learning and constantly
performing the core of traditional pieces shared by all koto groups and
also the repertoire particular to the Chikushi Kai. Importantly, it is
a group which is also open to contemporary music for the koto, so that
her repertoire encompasses such works as the compositions of Tadao
Sawai, Katsutoshi Nagasawa and Shinichi Yuize. From that spirit of
open-mindedness (within tradition), Shirley also pursued her interest in
jazz and as it extends to the koto, and improvisation.
In
1976, Shirley received her “Shihan” degree (instructor’s license) with
“Yushusho” (highest) honors from the Chikushi School in Fukuoka, Japan,
and her "Dai Shihan" Master’s degree from the same school in 2000 for
her mastery of the koto.
A
dedicated musician for over 50 years, Shirley strives to involve
diverse genres of art and music in her performances. She teaches
private students, and has offered classes in koto music at public
schools and at universities, most notably classes at UC
Berkeley. Shirley has incorporated storytelling, poetry, hip-hop,
gospel, bluegrass, jazz, European classical, and has arranged world
songs from countries such as China, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Philippines and
so on, for koto, as well as performing and arranging traditional and
contemporary Japanese songs, and composing her own koto pieces. She
also is the leader of the world jazz fusion group, the Murasaki
Ensemble.
“The
koto is an extremely versatile instrument,” says Shirley. “Though it
seems limited and simple in its nature, it’s possible to extract a
myriad of textures and sounds through various techniques and even
percussive rhythms by incorporating the body of the instrument itself.
The koto is initially easy to play, but it really takes years of
practice to be able to produce a good sound.”
Shirley’s
koto influences include koto masters Katsuko Chikushi, Kimio Eto, Kazue
Sawai, and June Kuramoto. Her jazz influences come from the members of
the her jazz group, the Murasaki Ensemble, who are Vince Delgado on
percussion, Jeff Massanari on guitar, Matt Eakle on flute, and Alex Baum
on bass.
Because of Shirley’s versatility on the koto, she has performed for many notable people and celebrities, such as: Senator
Diane Feinstein, George Lucas/Lucas Films, former Prime Minister
Yasuhiro Nakasone, Walter Shorenstein, Larry Ellison and Mikael
Gorbachev. She has also performed at many eclectic events from the
Fillmore and Union Street Jazz Festivals to the AT&T Golf Tournament
hosted by Clint Eastwood, Christina Aguilera, and the Sacramento,
Marin, and Fremont symphony orchestras. Shirley has performed at
numerous community events, and given of her time to many of them,
including annual Cherry Blossom Festivals in San Francisco and
Cupertino, many Obon festivals in Oakland, Palo Alto, Mountain View and
San Jose, just to name a few. In 2012, Shirley was honored by the Hokka
Nichibei Kai Bunka Japanese American Cultural Association of America by
being inducted into their Hall of Fame.
Shirley has
been most interested in researching Japanese traditional performance
arts in the World War II concentration camps, after finding out that her
mother learned to play the koto from koto teachers at Topaz and Tule
Lake camps during WWII. In 2012, she was awarded a National Parks
Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant to turn her
decades-long research into a documentary film. The film, “Japanese
Traditional Performance Arts in the World War II Internment Camps”
completed in 2014, includes interviews and stories from 21 people who
experienced Japanese performing arts in the camps, or were taught by
teachers from the camps, archival photos as well as actual film footage
of performances in the camps. Hidden Legacy has
been screened publicly at numerous community showings, at universities
including UC Berkeley, UCLA, Stanford, Tokyo Arts, Waseda, Musashino and
Doshisha Universities, and aired on public TV across the United States
since its premiere.
Takayo Fischer
Actress
Takayo Fischer learned kabuki, buyō, and shamisen while she
was interned at the Rohwer War Relocation Center in Arkansas during
WWII. She is best known for her roles as Mistress Chang in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End and as Suzanne, the secretary to Brad Pitt's character, Billy, in the film Moneyball.
Takayo is active with the renowned Asian American theater organization
East West Players in Los Angeles and has acted on Broadway.
