Japan Society announce Obayashi ’80s: The Onomichi Trilogy & Kadokawa Years, running February 7-14, 2025. The teenage symphonies of Nobuhiko Obayashi (1938-2020) are wound in a melancholy nostalgia for a period indelibly lost to time, neatly occupying the inexpressible gap between adolescence and adulthood. Woven through visually expressive fantasias with striking formal experimentation and pop-art boldness, Obayashi’s idiosyncratic cinematic language would produce some of Japan’s most beloved seishun eiga (youth films) throughout the 1980s, captivating generations of filmgoers with his earnest portrayals of young love and the vanished worldviews of youth, further bolstered by Kadokawa’s innovative tactics of popularizing dreamy pop idols like Hiroko Yakushimaru (Sailor Suit and Machine Gun) and Tomoyo Harada. Having premiered Obayashi’s films over the course of its film department’s existence—including the largest-ever North American Obayashi retrospective in 2015 with the filmmaker in attendance—Japan Society offers a special focus on his rarely-seen yet beloved Onomichi trilogy (1982-1985) and Kadokawa work.
With Obayashi’s career overshadowed abroad by the oddball eccentricity of his electric 1977 debut House, the 1980s would come to epitomize the height of his popularity, symbolized by his endearing Onomichi trilogy—set in the filmmaker’s hometown of Onomichi, the site of Yasujiro Ozu’s Tokyo Story. Devoted to the winding paths of his youth, Obayashi’s hometown trilogy—body-swap ATG feature I Are You, You Am Me (1982), timeslip romance The Little Girl Who Conquered Time (1983) and 1985’s conclusion Lonely Heart (a favorite of Akira Kurosawa’s) —present so-called “wrinkles,” as the filmmaker himself would put it, of the seaside town. Obayashi’s showcase of his provincial hometown would focus on eternal themes of lost love and nostalgia.
Kicking off on February 7 with a rare 35mm import of I Are You, You Am Me, Obayashi ’80s also features a rare 16mm import screening of Lonely Heart on February 8. Series highlights include Obayashi’s Kadokawa-era productions School in the Crosshairs, a gonzo, cosmic fantasy with extraterrestrial fascists; and His Motorbike, Her Island, a bosozoku (biker gang) melodrama of love-stricken, thrill-seeking motorbike enthusiasts; and the middle chapter of the Onomichi films, The Little Girl Who Conquered Time, a metaphysical love story that catapulted Tomoyo Harada to superstardom.
Tickets: $16/$14 students and seniors/$12 Japan Society members.
Screenings take place in Japan Society’s landmarked headquarters at 333 East 47th Street, one block from the United Nations. Lineup and other details subject to change. For complete information, visit japansociety.org. Tickets are available now.
About Nobuhiko Obayashi
Born in Onomichi, Hiroshima in 1938, Nobuhiko Obayashi began creating films at age three after first encountering a film projector in a home storage room. By the time he was in his 20s, his independent film Tabeta Hito aka The Person Who is Eaten (1963) won the Grand Jury Prize at the 1963 Belgium International Experimental Film Festival, and his 16mm experimental film Emotion (1966) played around Japan at galleries and universities to wide acclaim. During the early years of television, he directed many commercials with international figures such as Charles Bronson for the brand “Mandam”, Sophia Loren and Catherine Deneuve. In 1977, he directed his first feature film House, which won the Blue Ribbon Award for Best Newcomer, a prestigious award presented by film critics and writers in Japan. He has won many awards including the FIPRESCI Award at Berlin International Film Festival for Sada (1998). He is also the recipient of the Spring 2004 Medal of Honor with Purple Ribbon and the Fall 2009 The Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette from the Japanese government.
FILM DESCRIPTIONS
All films are listed alphabetically.
『彼のオートバイ、彼女の島』 (Kare no otobai, Kanojo no Shima)
Thursday, February 13 at 7:00 PM; Friday, February 14 at 9:15 PM
Dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi, 1986, 96 min., DCP, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Riki Takeuchi, Kiwako Harada, Noriko Watanabe.
Following a painful breakup, macho biker Koh (Riki Takeuchi) skips town and hits the road on his beloved Kawasaki W3 650. On his countryside excursion, he encounters the free-spirited Miyo (Kiwako Harada, older sister of Obayashi favorite Tomoyo Harada) who quickly takes interest in both the leather-clad Koh and his motorbike. Koh and Miyo fall in love even as Miyo’s prodigious biking talent and thrill-seeking tendencies heighten Koh’s fear that she may push it all too far. A nostalgia-filled reminiscence, Obayashi’s monochromatic dream playfully worships the biker culture of yesteryear, delivering a sentimental and liberating take on young love. A Cult Epics Release.
『天国にいちばん近い島』 (Tengoku ni ichiban chikai shima)
Sunday, February 9 at 5:00 PM
Dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi, 1984, DCP, 103 min., color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Tomoyo Harada, Ryoichi Takayanagi, Toru Minegishi, Miyoko Akaza.
Based on Katsura Morimura’s 1966 best-selling travelogue, Obayashi’s paradise-laden coming-of-age tale is an island retreat to the white sands of New Caledonia. Fulfilling her late father’s (YMO’s Yukihiro Takahashi) dream to take her to “the island closest to heaven,” bookish teen Mari (Tomoyo Harada) ventures solo to the archipelago’s indigo waters in search of this mythic locale. Taking in the island’s sites, Mari journeys off the beaten path, befriending a host of friendly locals in the process, from islander Taro (Ryoichi Takayanagi) to footloose tour guide Yuichi. One of Obayashi’s breeziest features, filled with a sense of old school Hollywood romanticism, The Island Closest to Heaven forms an affecting portrait of a young girl’s journey to self-discovery and her own piece of heaven deep within. A Cult Epics Release.
The Little Girl Who Conquered Time
『時をかける少女』 (Toki o Kakeru Shoujo)
Saturday, February 8 at 5:00 PM; Friday, February 14 at 7:00 PM
Dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi, 1983, DCP, 104 min., color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Tomoyo Harada, Ryoichi Takayanagi, Toshinori Omi.
Adapting sci-fi author Yasutaka Tsutsui’s famous 1967 novel-of-the-same-name, The Little Girl Who Conquered Time cast Tomoyo Harada in her feature film debut, launching the Kadokawa pop idol into superstardom. After suffering a fainting spell in her school’s laboratory, 16-year-old Kazuko Yoshiyama (Harada) begins to experience a strange phenomenon throughout her daily life—temporal leaps backward and forward in time—disorienting her as she relives moments time and time again, as days past return to present. Lost in a sea of time, Kazuko’s desperate pleas to exist in the present are answered, amidst the swell of FX wizardry, musical overtures and, most of all, the anchor of young love. Lyrical, romantic and longing, Obayashi’s second Onomichi film is a genuine expression of the filmmaker’s reflections on the poetic transcendence of love—cast across the stars for a young girl who lives in tomorrow. A Cult Epics Release.
I Are You, You Am Me (Exchange Students)
Friday, February 7 at 7:00 PM; Thursday, February 13 at 9:15 PM
Dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi, 1982, 112 min., 35mm, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Toshinori Omi, Satomi Kobayashi, Makoto Sato.
Imported 35mm Print. Falling down a steep set of stairs, classmates Kazuo and Kazumi find they’ve switched bodies—a dilemma that complicates manifold as the two realize they need to live out each other’s lives, both at school and home. A gender-swap youth film based on Hisashi Yamanaka’s novel Exchange Students, Obayashi’s first entry in his Onomichi trilogy is colored by the filmmaker’s lively brand of humor as the two struggle to conform to the expected ways boys and girls must behave. Obayashi’s film offers an inventive mix of formal play—8mm, black-and-white, and color photography—all packaged within a heartfelt melodrama that functions not only as a goodbye to childhood, but as an effortless evocation of the streets of Obayashi’s youth: a display of classical orchestrations accompanying the late summer hana-bi, small-gauge captures of trudging tugboats and the crimson sunsets of Onomichi’s rolling hills.
Saturday, February 8 at 8:00 PM
Dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi, 1985, 112 min., 16mm, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Toshinori Omi, Yasuko Tomita, Yumiko Fujita.
40th Anniversary—Imported 16mm Print. The finale to Obayashi’s Onomichi trilogy, Lonely Heart is a nostalgic rite of passage, nestled in the familiar pathways of his hometown. Schoolboy Hiroki (Toshinori Omi) is an amateur photographer and hapless romantic, transfixed by a sad-looking girl at his school—his self-described “Lonely Heart.” However, his inexpressible feelings and longing are disrupted by the appearance of a mysterious girl in the convex of his camera lens: a mischievous, white-faced tomboy who goes by the name Lonely Heart. A feature that impressed Akira Kurosawa so much so that he asked his entire staff to watch it, Lonely Heart is a virtuosic recollection of first love and the intrinsic emotions that bubble to the surface; its bittersweet tristesse echoing through the melancholic refrain of Chopin’s Étude Op. 10, No. 3.
Friday, February 7 at 9:15 PM; Sunday, February 9 at 7:15 PM
Dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi, 1981, 90 min., DCP, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Hiroko Yakushimaru, Ryoichi Takayanagi, Toru Minegishi, Makoto Tezuka.
Released months before lead Hiroko Yakushimaru’s breakthrough hit Sailor Suit and Machine Gun, Obayashi’s first groundbreaking idol picture is a dazzling mix of special effects and blue-screen artifice—a stylistic flair perfected in Obayashi’s debut House, now utilized for the onset of an alien invasion. Ordinary schoolgirl Yuka’s (Yakushimaru) new term comes to an odd start when she inexplicably stops an accident by using latent psychic powers. Troubled by her newfound abilities, Yuka also senses a strange force start to take hold of the school, with students turning into mind-controlled fascists, patrolling school halls, stifling dissent and mandating the re-education of freethinkers. A psychotronic fantasy forged into a young girl’s destiny to defend the planet, School in the Crosshairs is a cosmic overload of extraterrestrial tyrants, preternatural powers and Obayashi’s uniquely adroit filmmaking abilities, underlaid with an existential cry for free will. A Cult Epics Release.
SCREENING DATES
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 7
7 PM I Am You, You Are Me
9:15 PM School in the Crosshairs
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 8
5 PM The Little Girl Who Conquered Time
8 PM Lonely Heart
SUNDAY FEBRUARY 9
5 PM The Island Closest to Heaven
7:15 PM School In the Crosshairs
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 13
7 PM His Motorbike, Her Island
9:15 PM I Am You, You Are Me
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14
7 PM The Little Girl Who Conquered Time
9:15 PM His Motorbike, Her Island
Curated by Alexander Fee.
Special Thanks to Nico B (Cult Epics); Akinaru Rokkaku & Shun Inoue (Japan Foundation); Yukiko Wachi (Kawakita Memorial Film Institute); Mayumi Furuyama (Nippon Television Network Corp.); Shion Komatsu & Go Onishi (Toho).
Film programs are generously supported by ORIX Corporation USA, public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, Anime NYC and Yen Press. Endowment support is provided by the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Endowment Fund and The John and Miyoko Davey Endowment Fund. Additional season support is provided by The Globus Family, David Toberisky, and Film Circle members.
Transportation assistance is provided by Japan Airlines, the official Japanese airline sponsor of Japan Society Film Program. Housing assistance is provided by the Prince Kitano New York, the official hotel sponsor of Japan Society Film Program.
About Japan Society Film
Spurred on by the success of the 1970 Donald Richie-curated MoMA retrospective The Japanese Film: 1896-1969, Japan Society committed to making film one of its key programs in the early seventies—quickly becoming the premier venue for the exhibition of new Japanese cinema as well as career-spanning retrospectives on seminal directors and actors. In 1979, Japan Society established the Japan Film Center, formalizing film as a full-fledged, year-round program aimed at cultivating a deep appreciation and understanding of Japanese film culture among American audiences. Over the years, Japan Society Film has hosted numerous high-profile premieres and programs that include visits from Akira Kurosawa, Toshiro Mifune, Hideko Takamine, and Nobuhiko Obayashi. In 2007, Japan Society Film launched JAPAN CUTS: Festival of New Japanese Film, the largest festival of its kind in North America.