Otaku

JAPlan

January 1984 •German

A portrait of the German electronic band "Der Plan". Büld follows the band on their tour through Japan.

Searching for the Standing Boy of Nagasaki

August 2020 •English

October 1945. A young Japanese boy in the devastated city of Nagasaki, two months after the atomic bomb, carries on his back the lifeless body of his younger brother. An American military photographer, Joe O'Donnell, took a picture of the boy standing stoically near a cremation pit. No one knows the subject's name, but the photo has become an iconic image of the human tragedy of nuclear war. This documentary follows the continuing efforts to deepen understanding of the photograph, while exploring the fate of thousands of atomic-bomb orphans and their struggles to survive the aftermath of World War II.

Joanne Martin: A Life in Miniature

October 2017 •English

A septuagenarian woman from St. Louis, Missouri has been a miniaturist, businesswoman, museum president, Girl Scout leader, teacher, student, mother, daughter, and most of all, an indomitable human spirit. Life is what you make it.

Japans tätowierte Helden

January 2024 •German

Aldo Giannini: Pacific Theatre

January 2014 •English

Like many other young men of his generation, after Pearl Harbor was attacked, Aldo Giannini joined the Marines with little idea of what lay ahead. After training, he was quickly deployed overseas and fought in the bloody Battle of Tarawa, surviving with a shrapnel injury and the haunting memory of witnessing the loss of 3,250 U.S. lives. He went on to fight in other battles and returned home after 3 intense years of service. Nearly eight decades later, he still questions if winning the island was worth the price.

Outsiders: Japan

March 2012 •English

Join Phil Morrison and James Robinson from Driftworks, Mitto Steele from MeiNoMai and Pieter Gouwy from Garage Portello on a mind blowing tour of the real drift scene in Japan and the culture behind it.

Half-Life in Fukushima

June 2016 •French

In the aftermath of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, a Japanese farmer ekes out a solitary existence within the radiation red zone.

SHOOTER

January 2024 •Italian

A short audiovisual portrait of Giulio Nick Piacentini, a young sound engineer with a hobby for nature photography. Realized for the Filmmaking Laboratory at DAMS RomaTre with Antonietta De Lillo.

The Hobby

February 2024 •English

Follows longtime collectors and a new generation of buyers from the trading card industry, diving deep into the real-time trading card fever as the hobby goes nuclear.

Io sono nata viaggiando

November 2013 •Italian

A journey back through Dacia Maraini's and her trips around the world with her close friends cinema director Pier Paolo Pasolini and opera singer Maria Callas. An in-depth story of this fascinating woman's life. Maraini's memories come alive through personal photographs taken on the road as well as her own Super 8 films shot almost thirty years ago.

Un pò di Giappone

January 1990 •Italian

In the 1980s, Michelangelo Antonioni traveled with his partner, actress and filmmaker Enrica Fico Antonioni, to Japan with the intent of creating a documentary, Un viaggio in Giappone, that would chronicle “the social transformations undergoing in Japan through the experimental use of new film technologies,” specifically the Betacam. Un pò di Giappone is the shortened version of the documentary.

Plató

November 2022 •Spanish

The Cove

July 2009 •English

The Cove tells the amazing true story of how an elite team of individuals, films makers and free divers embarked on a covert mission to penetrate the hidden cove in Japan, shining light on a dark and deadly secret. The shocking discoveries were only the tip of the iceberg.

Takeda

October 2017 •Spanish

Takeda is a film about the universality of the human being seen thru the eyes of a Japanese painter that has adopted the Mexican culture.

The Great Happiness Space: Tale of an Osaka Love Thief

January 2006 •English

Welcome to The Great Happiness Space: Rakkyo Café. The club's owner, Issei (22), has a staff of twenty boys all under his training to become the top escorts of Osaka's underground love scene. During their training, they learn how to dress, how to talk, how to walk, and most importantly, how to fake relationships with the girls who become their source of income. Join us as Osaka's number one host boy takes us on a journey through the complex and heartrenching world of love for sale in the Japanese underground.

Raise Your Arms and Twist - Documentary of NMB48

January 2016 •Japanese

Launched in 2011 as a sister group to girl band behemoth AKB48, the Osaka-based NMB48 has become a musical force itself. With a string of No.1 hit singles and albums, not to mention sell-out performances, NMB48 continues Japan’s pop-music phenomena. Director Funahashi Atsushi, whose documentary work has previously chronicled such harrowing events as the Fukushima nuclear meltdown, pulls back the curtain on the life and struggles of the band members and the workings of the idol-making industry.

Cosplay, más que disfrazarse

Invalid date •Spanish

My Date with Drew

August 2005 •English

Ever since the second grade when he first saw her in E.T. The Extraterrestrial, Brian Herzlinger has had a crush on Drew Barrymore. Now, 20 years later he's decided to try to fulfill his lifelong dream by asking her for a date. There's one small problem: She's Drew Barrymore and he's, well, Brian Herzlinger, a broke 27-year-old aspiring filmmaker from New Jersey.

Batchan

March 2020 •Portuguese

Teachings of an Issei. Advice, spirituality and challenges.

Ona Carbonell: Starting Over

February 2022 •Spanish

In August 2020, Olympic artistic swimmer Ona Carbonell became a first time mother, an experience that reshaped her life overnight.