Armed with a press pass and the Japanese language level of a 3 year old, Ben took to the cinemas of Tokyo during the 38th Tokyo International Film Festival. Ben’s coverage spans a varied 17 films over 10 days of the festival: buzzy and fresh Japanese films (Bring Him Down to a Portable Size; The Last Blossom; All Greens…) international film festival darlings (Lost Land; Palestine 36…), and a handful of exciting restorations (Demon Pond, Love Massacre…). 

And if you haven’t listened to Ben’s interviews from during the festival, what are you waiting for?

114. Sato and Sato (2025): Interview with Director Amano Chihiro

116. Morte Cucina (2025): Interview with Pen-ek Ratanaruang and Bella Boonsang (forthcoming!)

Other Links:

Chloe Zhao x Hirokazu Koreeda

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Timestamps:

00:00:00 Intro

00:04:23 TIFF38 Press Experience

00:08:55 Demon Pond (1979) dir. Masahiro Shinoda

00:14:28 Pale Flower (1964) dir. Masahiro Shinoda 

00:17:55 Floating Clouds (1955) dir. Mikio Naruse

00:23:32 Love Massacre (1981) dir. Patrick Tam

00:29:01 April Story (1998) dir. April Story

00:32:58 3.11 disaster sidebar

00:36:10 Blonde (2025) dir. Yûichirô Sakashita

00:39:35 Sato and Sato (2025) dir. Chihiro Amano

00:43:41 All Greens (2025) dir. Takashi Koyama

00:47:40 The Last Blossom (2025) dir. Baku Kinoshita

00:52:35 Lost Land (2025) dir. Akio Fujimoto

00:58:30 Echoes of the Orient (2025) dir. Yang Liping

01:00:55 Labyrinth (2025) dir. Shoji Kawamori

01:03:46 Bring Him Down to a Portable Size (2025) dir. Ryota Nakano

01:07:18 Morte Cucina (2025) dir. Pen-Ek Ratanaruang

01:12:45 Palestine 36 (2025) dir. Annemarie Jacir

01:20:16 The Mastermind (2025) dir. Kelly Reichardt

01:24:23 Hamnet (2025) dir. Chloé Zhao

01:32:55 Wrap-up