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Free admission. No advance reservations. Your seat will be assigned to you when you pick up your ticket at the box office. Seats are assigned on a first come, first served basis. The box office opens one hour before the event.
In person: benshi Ichirō Kataoka, composer and pianist Makia Matsumura.
Screening 1 of 3
The Lump
Year: 1929 Country: Japan Language: intertitles in Japanese with English subtitles Runtime: 14 min. 35mm. B&W.
An old man lost in the woods stumbles onto a band of boisterous tengu, bird-like goblins of Japanese folklore, who demand to be entertained in this wonderfully detailed Japanese animated fairytale.
Director: Murata Yasuji.
Print courtesy of the National Film Archive of Japan.
Screening 2 of 3
The Thief of Baguda Castle
Year: 1926 Country: Japan Language: intertitles in Japanese with English subtitles Runtime: 14 min. 35mm. B&W.
Japanese animation pioneer Ofuji Noburō’s first film, The Thief of Baguda Castle premiered on the same bill with Teinosuke Kinugasa’s A Page of Madness in 1926. While Kinugasa was advancing live-action cinema, Noburō introduced his own new stop-motion technique using cut outs of colorfully patterned paper called chiyogami. The film’s main character, Dangobei, a roustabout who nevertheless wins the favor and hand of a princess with help from some obliging spirits, became a recurring character in Noburo’s later work.
Director: Ofuji Noburō.
Print courtesy of the National Film Archive of Japan.
Preserved by the UCLA Film & Television Archive as part of Outfest UCLA Legacy Project, with funding by the National Film Preservation Foundation.
Screening 3 of 3
A Page of Madness
Kurutta ichipeiji
Year: 1926 Country: Japan Language: intertitles in Japanese with English subtitles Runtime: 70 min. Digital. B&W.
World Premiere of New Restoration!
Japanese novelist (and later Nobel Prize winner) Yasunari Kawabata devised the scenario (with contributions from other members of the radical literary movement known as Shinkankakuha) for director Teinosuke Kinugasa’s visionary masterpiece. Believing his wanton cruelty drove his wife insane, a guilt-wracked husband devotes himself to her care as a janitor at the asylum where she’s incarcerated. When it appears her illness may prevent their daughter from getting married, he gradually loses his own grip on reality. Kinugasa’s fantastical images, disorienting super impositions and rapid montage confirmed the expressive power of Japanese silent film. The Archive is honored to premiere this new restoration from the National Film Archive of Japan on the film’s centennial.
Director: Teinosuke Kinugasa. Screenwriters: Yasunari Kawabata, Teinosuke Kinugasa, Minoru Inuzuka, Bankō Sawada. With: Masao Inoue, Yoshie Nakagawa, Ayako Iijima.
Restored by the National Film Archive of Japan