Kenji Ishizaka Maps a Wider Asia at Tokyo Film Festival

Ten features from across a definition of Asia that stretches from Japan to the Middle East: that is Asian Future, the section curated by Kenji Ishizaka at the 39th Tokyo International Film Festival, running until Wednesday, November 4. Ishizaka, TIFF's senior programmer and professor and dean of the Japan Institute of the Moving Image, explained why his map of the continent deliberately exceeds the official one.

The interview was conducted during the festival, with interpretation by Etsuko Yamanouchi, and ranged from selection policy to a director who died before he could attend.

How wide is Asia?

Ishizaka rejects the narrow framing. "The definition given by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan is quite narrow for the definition of Asia—it only includes up to India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and the east of it," he said. "However, we try to expand it further west in terms of geography and history as well, because of certain connections we have. So we include West Asia as well as Middle East."

He cites two cultural currents to justify the broader map. Islamic culture runs from the Middle East through Pakistan, the Malay Peninsula, Indonesia and into the Philippines—Mindanao, he notes, is very Islamic. Running the other way, Japanese anime and manga have influenced Middle Eastern cultures, a debt often referenced in their films. Where European cinema largely rests on Christian culture, Asia's languages and religions vary enormously. "In choosing films, I place importance on both commonality and individual differences among countries," he said.

What holds the ten films together?

A theme emerged without being programmed: family. Parent-child relationships and sibling dynamics dominate, and children keep appearing on screen. "As for how we choose the defined area, I've already mentioned it, but there are certain things you could see as the thread that puts them together after you watch all 10 films," Ishizaka said. His theory: "At this unstable period of wars and conflicts that we feel could be approaching, humans tend to look at the smallest community around you, which is family." Many films view adult-built societies through children's eyes. He doesn't know whether the pattern is conscious.

Small budgets, strict rules

Asian Future admits only films from within a director's first three features. Debut or third film makes no difference: "We only look at what's in front of us," Ishizaka said.

He singled out Chezhiyan's Paper Flower, a low-budget Indian film that became a festival talking point. "I often find gem-like films in that kind of small-budget category," he said, adding that in the digital era excellent films can be made cheaply. The choice was pointed: "We chose this film because we wanted to show the audience there are different types of Indian films—not just Bollywood." Some viewers, he said, expected song-and-dance and were "very pleasantly taken aback." He sees Robert Bresson's influence in the film's close-ups of hands handling books, and notes it reuses an old song from another film—a cinephile's reward. The director died suddenly in July; his wife and producer, Prema Chezhiyan, attended in his place. He had shot only two films.

A jury of producers, not stars

Asked about this year's jury—two CEO/producers and one director—Ishizaka framed Asian Future as infrastructure rather than red carpet. "I feel its role is to create a 'park' where Asian filmmakers meet with other filmmakers or producers, etc of the world," he said. "We want to create a big forum for that. So for that reason, I feel it's important to involve lots of producers as well."

His names to watch: Katski Flores, director of EDJPOP, who folds 50 years of Filipino history into a family drama rather than a direct statement against Ferdinand Marcos Jr.; Navid Mahmoudi, an actor who won TIFF's best actor award in 2019 and directed I'm Nothing Special Really, depicting young Iranian women whose lives contradict news imagery; and Azamat Shargyn, the Kazakh actor-turned-director whose Shyrmauyq Ishizaka calls, without blinking, "Tarkovsky in Kazakhstan."

On the American market's appetite for Asian cinema, he is measured. Oscar nominations now show more diversity, he said, and Southeast Asian countries, growing wealthier, are producing larger-scale films with developing distribution channels. Many Asian countries were colonized, he noted—"there are many, many stories to be told there." With good production teams, he expects more and more strong films to reach world audiences, well past the 39th edition's closing night.