Nippon Connection encourages Solidarity With Japan

Nippon Connection

Encourages Solidarity With Japan

Last Sunday marked the end of the

eleventh edition of the Japanese Film Festival Nippon Connection in Frankfurt.

Once again, the festival received an enormous reaction from the audience, and

more than 16,000 visitors attended well over 100 of the latest short and

feature films from Japan as well as around 30 accompanying events. After five

exciting days of cultural exchange, the last evening saw a sold out screening

of COLORFUL by Keiichi HARA and the award ceremony for the seventh NIPPON

CINEMA AWARD and the second NIPPON VISIONS AWARD, with more than 60 film-makers

and artists from Japan as guests. 

In the contest for the NIPPON

CINEMA AWARD, the audience chose the animation film ARRIETTY by Hiromasa

YONEBAYASHI, the latest production of Ghibli Studio, as the winner. For the

sixth time, the award endowed with 2,000 € was sponsored by Bankhaus Metzler.

Gerhard Wiesheu of Bankhaus Metzler declared the laureate and entrusted the

award to Takashi NISHIMURA, managing director of UNIJAPAN (an organization for

the promotion of Japanese film), in lieu of the absent director. The comedy WIG

by Renpei TSUKAMOTO also won the hearts of the audience and came in second,

while RINCO'S RESTAURANT by Mai TOMINAGA made it to third place.

The most promising film in the NIPPON

VISIONS section (formerly known as NIPPON DIGITAL) was awarded a jury prize in

cooperation with Japan Visualmedia Translation Academy (JVTA) for the second

time. The festival jury gave the NIPPON VISIONS AWARD to DOMAN SEMAN by

Go SHIBATA, an "essential cinematic assault", as the jury statement

explained. Jury members Tom Mes (midnighteye.com), Maggie Lee (Hollywood

Reporter) and Rüdiger Suchsland (FAZ, Filmdienst) also made a special honorary

mention of DOOR TO THE SEA by Reiko OHASHI. The Nippon Visions Award will

enable the director of the winning film to produce a subtitling for his

following project and thus find an international audience again. As

representatives of JVTA, Kyotake ISHII and Nami ASAKAWA gave this award to

Takashi NISHIMURA too, who acted as trustee for both winners.

At the award ceremony, festival

coordinator Marion Klomfass also introduced the new program team for Nippon

Connection 2011. After the withdrawal of festival co-founder Holger Ziegler,

and also of Alexander Zahlten and Christiane Borchert last year, Marion

Klomfass, Petra Palmer, Dennis Vetter and Atsuko MORIMUNE (Tokyo) were

responsible for the film program while Hannah Bohr and Jasmin Rolli developed

the concept for the Nippon Culture program.

In view of the current situation in

Japan, Nippon Connection 2011 was dominated by solidarity and exchange. The

sales revenues of the HELP JAPAN! party on Saturday were entirely donated, a

tombola and further donation options at the festival center increased the

amount to help earthquake and tsunami victims in Japan. Moreover, every sold

movie ticket added 50 cents. 

Nippon Connection also reacted to

the latest incidents in Japan by adding special events dealing with the

problematic aspects of nuclear energy. Director and anti-nuclear activist

Hitomi KAMANAKA visited the festival and presented her two documentaries

ROKKASHO RHAPSODY and ASHES TO HONEY, trying to raise awareness for the dangers

of nuclear energy. In the following conversations with the director, many

visitors took the opportunity to learn about the Japanese perspective of the

current situation. 

With a total number of 102 short and

feature films presented this year and more than 16,000 visitors, Nippon

Connection is the biggest Japanese film festival outside of Japan. Once again

the festival was patronized by Mrs. Eva Kühne-Hörmann, Hessian Minister of

Science and the Arts, the General Consul of Japan in Frankfurt, and Prof. Dr.

Dr. Matthias Lutz-Bachmann, Vice President of Goethe-University Frankfurt. For

eleven years Nippon Connection has been organized on a voluntary basis by non

profit Nippon Connection registered association. 

The festival team is already looking

forward to next year when it will be: Youkoso! Welcome to the 12th NIPPON

CONNECTION Film Festival!