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Obayashi 1980’s Kadokawa films

The teenage symphonies of Nobuhiko Obayashi (1938-2020) are wound in a melancholy nostalgia for a period indelibly lost to time—that inexpressible gap between adolescence and adulthood. Braiding visually expressive fantasias with striking formal experimentation and pop-art boldness, Obayashi’s idiosyncratic cinematic language produced some of Japan’s most beloved seishun eiga (coming-of-age youth films) in the 1980s. Captivating generations of filmgoers with his earnest portraits of young love and vanished worldviews, Obayashi’s films were further bolstered by Kadokawa’s innovative tactics of popularizing dreamy pop idols like Hiroko Yakushimaru and Tomoyo Harada.

With a career overshadowed abroad by the oddball eccentricity of his electric 1977 debut House, the 1980s would prove to be the high-water mark of Obayashi’s popularity. Framed in 35mm viewfinders, against wildly ingenious chroma-key composites and characterized by his unflagging optimism for the youth of Japan, Obayashi’s youth passages are...

Those who have explored Nobuhiko Obayashi‘s body of work beyond his infamous “House” will certainly know about his feelings of nostalgia for his hometown of Onomichi. After this aforementioned debut feature he would re-visit his childhood and youth in Onomichi time and time again in his movies. “I Are You, You Am Me”, “The Girl Who Leapt Through Time” and “Chizuko’s Younger Sister” may be based on novels, but at the same time, they presented an opportunity for the director to explore his feelings for his hometown, how he grew up and eventually developed a predilection for animation and the arts in general. “Lonely Heart” from 1985 works in a similar fashion, being a coming-of-age story on the one hand, and at the same time, a tragic-comic look back to a youth defined by unrequited love, a somewhat difficult relationship with adults and finding an artistic voice.

Lonely Heart...

After his first feature “House”, which would go on to become a cult classic, Nobuhiko Obayashi would go on to make movies which further explored the themes of growing up, conformity and gender roles within society. “I Are You, You Am Me”, based on a novel by Hisashi Yamanaka, is a coming-of-age story which employs the use of a gender swap as well as the comedic and silly consequences that follow. It is a feature which, despite having some absurd elements, is quite a change coming from a first movie such as “House”, although both stories share a common ground, as the former also includes a coming-of-age theme at its core. However, “I Are You, You Am Me” is much more linear in its storytelling and less experimental in its visuals.

I Are, You Am Me is screening at Japan Society as part of the Obayashi ’80s: The Onomichi Trilogy...

Japanese film ‘The Zen Diary', which depicts Buddhist vegetarian cuisine and the sustainable lifestyle in Nagano, will be screening in Toronto in May 2024! Director Yuji Nakae will be attending all the screenings below.

Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre: May 23 (https://jccc.on.ca/film/zen-diary-2024-encore )

Revue Cinema: May 24 & 25 (https://revuecinema.ca/films/the-zen-diary/)

Title: The Zen Diary （『土を喰らう十二ヵ月』）

Director/Script: Yuji Nakae

Casts: Kenji Sawada, Takako Matsu, Naomi Nishida, Toshinori Omi, Koihachi Takigawa, Fumi Dan, Shohei

Hino, Tomoko Naraoka

Based on the book by Tsutomu Mizukami

Cooking: Yoshiharu Doi / Music: Yoshihide Otomo

Synopsis:

Tsutomu lives alone in the mountains, writing essays and cooking food with vegetables he grows and mushrooms he picks in the hills. His routine is happily disturbed when Machiko, his editor/love interest, occasionally visits. She loves to eat, and he loves to cook for her. Tsutomu seems content with his daily life. On the other hand,...

In the career of Nobuhiko Obayashi, his works from the 1980s are certainly some of the most interesting features the director made. Although some of these movies have become somewhat obscure and hard to find for film fans wanting to discover more from Obayashi besides arguably his most popular work today, his 1977 feature “House”. One of the director’s favorite works was “The Girl Who Leapt Through Time”, an adaptation of the novel of the same title by Yasutaka Tsutsui, which also served as the foundation to the 2006 anime directed by Mamoru Hosoda. In his approach to the source material, Obayashi and screenwriter Wataru Kenmotsu highlight the idea of the story being about growth as well as the various irritations when becoming an adult.

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on Terracotta

Kazuko Yoshiyama (Tomoyo Harada) is a high-school student living in the city of Onomichi. One day, as she is tasked with cleaning the chemistry lab,...