Screening report 3-4.07.2009

My film was shown at the "film festival" for the first time, so I went to Tateyama city, Chiba prefecture for Awa Peace Film Festival. Tateyama city locates two hours away from Tokyo by highway bus. Popular tourist place for beach and marine sports.

Tateyama Station


I checked in the hotel near the station.

When I arrived at the venue, I met film festival staff and did sound check for the screening. My film is super home-made, so only my film had to be lower the volume because of the loud traffic noise in Parliament Square!


At the opening, the film festival representative, Yagi-san had a speech.

Film festival was held for two days (Friday and Saturday). The first day was only one screening, America Banzai. The post screening talk by Asako Kageyama san (producer and interviewer of the film).

After the first day screening, we went to the restaurant/bar in the city with film festival members.

Tateyama is also known for very fresh raw fish (Sashimi).

On Saturday, I changed my hotel because I decided to stay one more day here. I had to go to airport on early Sunday morning to go to Fukuoka (Fukuoka Asian Film Festival), so it was easy for me to stay in Tateyama and go to the airport from there. This hotel is so old Japanese style!


In the room.

Saturday was my screening day. Before my film, I looked around the venue and took photos.

Film Festival venue.

Entrance

Many of the film festival staff and also some audiences are organic farmers. They brought home-grown rice and vegetables. They were very tasty!

After my screening, I did post screening talk in the meeting room as film festivals's special event!

MC was Mao-san, film festival staff.


In the talk, we talked about the possibility of independent media. I talked about my experience how to make the documentary with the very cheap camera! In Tateyama, it is not a small city, but they don't have a cinema at all. So, for them, having film festival is a good opportunity to know what's going on in Japan and elsewhere. It is also important for them to have own media to get information for themselves. The talk lasted nearly two hours and I had a very good time with the audience.