Japan’s cultural connect via films

Simran Sodhi

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This year being the ‘The Year of Japan-India Friendly Exchanges’, the Japanese Embassy here held the screening of short Japanese films earlier last week. Seigo Tono, the festival director of ‘Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia’ spoke about how culture, especially films, can serve as a link between different cultures and societies, recalling how struck he had been when he first watched Satyajit Ray films and how the Apu Trilogy had stayed with him all these years. 

Tono, who studied journalism at Pepperdine University in the US, after spending three years as a student in France, fell in love with the world of films. Speaking of two of Ray’s movies, “Charulata” and “Mahanagar”, he says these aptly highlighted issues such as feminism and modernity — “the saga of a woman going out and working in the modern world.” 

Tono says among the filmmakers whose works have been screened at the festival are Mumbai-based Piya Shah, who won the festival award in 2008, and Mira Nair.

The Japanese Embassy screened four short films. One of these, ‘Can & Sulochan’ is about an Indian protagonist, Sulochan, who has just moved to Japan and is having trouble getting used to life there. One fine day, he meets “Can”, a talking vending machine, and his life takes a turn. “Color of Life”, another documentary screened, is an ode to a mother-daughter duo who devote their lives to understanding and preserving the Japanese textiles. The underlying thought, of course, is to reach out to the Indian audiences and introduce them to Japan’s intricate dyeing process.

Mention Bollywood, and Tono says, “The big ones, the famous ones, are watched in Japan but not regularly.”

Tono’s presence in the Capital and the screening of short films for Indian audiences highlights the fact that cinema can play an important role in connecting different cultures.