Fifteen short features by independent Japanese filmmakers were screened the weekend of November 1-2 as part of the thirteenth annual New York Japan CineFest (NYJCF) at the Asia Society in Manhattan and at the Thespis Theater in Queens. Mar Creation was the main host of the festival, working in collaboration with the Asia Society, the Hellenic Cultural Center NYC, the Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia and the Jimbocho Movie Festival.
NYJCF had been founded in 2012 by three Japanese cineastes in New York: Yasu Suzuki, Kosuke Furukawa, and Hiroshi Kono.

Among the films screened in Queens on November 2 were the following five: Resettlement: Chicago Story by Reina Higashitani, UME or (The Will To Fly Blind) by Sam Kumiko Sheridan, Me and Her by Romi Hasegawa, Future! Future! By Kairi Manabe and Yoshihiko Yamamoto, and Wandering Memories by Yuta Noguchi.

• Resettlement: Chicago Story is a poignant vignette about the Yamamoto family, one of thousands of Japanese Americans who were forcibly relocated to Chicago after they were released from WWII-era internment camps. The film does not directly address any of the complex political issues surrounding the internment, in which more than 120,000 Japanese Americans lost their homes, mostly on the West Coast. Instead, Resettlement: Chicago Story focuses its lens on three members of one family as they struggle to rebuild their lives by running a dry-cleaning store in a new city half a continent away from their abandoned homes. Three generations of the family are represented in this touching narrative: a stoic grandfather (issei) played by Toshio Hirano, a beleaguered mother (nisei) played by Natsuko Aoike, and a fashion-minded teenager (sansei), played by Lynn Masako Cheng. Like many of her peers, the young Mary Yamamoto aspires to be a typical American as she pores through magazines and dreams of attiring herself in a stunning gown for a school dance competition—which seems to be an impossible fantasy given the family’s meager income. Thanks to the love of her mother and grandfather, however, the young girl is gifted with the dress of her dreams, and the black-and-white film morphs into color as the three dance together joyously.

• UME or (The Will To Fly Blind) is a thought-provoking film that explores some dark recesses of the human experience. In this touching film set in New York City, a seventeen-year-old girl named Ume (played admirably by Grace Nakazawa Santos) contemplates ending an unwanted pregnancy, a decision that is emotionally and psychologically overwhelming, especially when she’s confronted with so-called “pro-life” protesters at the clinic that will perform the operation. The title offers an interesting play on words. Ume is the Japanese word for “plum,” whose blossoms were traditionally revered as a harbinger of spring and new growth. In English, the word connotes “you” and “me”, implying that difficulties can be surmounted by compassion and mutual support. As Ume ultimately confides in her father (sensitively played by Tatsuo Ichikawa), she is blessed with the strength to deal with such a life-changing decision. This touching story ends with an animation scene in which Ume sprouts wings and flies high above the earth, signaling her emotional transformation.

• Me and Her (not to be confused with other films that have similar titles), explores the joys of same-sex attraction via a tender story of two young women in an affectionate relationship. When Harper Clark (played by Sefa Rina) tells her lover Nana Shinomura (played by Sayu Kubota) that she has been accepted into university, Nana breaks off their relationship out of fear of public disapproval, only to return to Harper a year later with Hana, her newborn daughter in tow. No details about the child’s conception are proferred, but none of that is necessary. With a child now part of the family, the two women rekindle their liaison with renewed affection, having put fear and suspicion behind them. Director Romi Hasegawa has wisely chosen to avoid making this film a polemical diatribe that argues on behalf of lesbianism. Me and Her is instead a touching narrative about two mommies living a life of devotion to each other and to their young child.

• Part sci-fi fantasy and part psychological thriller, Future! Future! is a cutting-edge film that uses plenty of humor to probe the deep existential questions about what it means to be human in an increasingly digitized world. The story revolves around young Makoto Tsukino, a quirky, underachieving high-school girl played by Ren Komai. Makoto, who loves science (and science fiction) dreams of designing a robot but lacks the scholastic ability to make her dreams come true. She is visited by Shinichi (played by Ui Mihara), a time traveler from a dystopic future, who convinces Makoto that she needs to get her act together in order to save humanity. This light-hearted film is decidedly not a heavy-handed candidate for the Twilight Zone, however. Under the deft direction of Kairi Manabe and Yoshihiko Yamamoto, the characters move and breathe in a realistic environment that serves to accentuate Makoto’s nerdiness as well as Shinichi’s earnestness.

• Wandering Memories tackles the age-old story of grief and loss as a young mother mourns the disappearance of her young son, who has drowned. Shiori Sato (played by Natsuko Haru) has been searching for her son Taka, who had disappeared around his first birthday. One day, she meets a so-called “information pawnbroker,” a mysterious other-worldly figure (played by Yoshiko Takehara) who convinces Shiori that ‘wanted information” can be exchanged for “memories of commensurate value.” As Shiori shares memories of her son skimming stones across the waters of a pond, she is gifted with a magical stone that leads her to his watery grave. Director Yuta Noguchi says she made this heart-wrenching film to help people assuage their grief over the loss of loved ones. “The more it is a unique treasure, the more this endless sadness that gnaws at the heart rushes in,” Noguchi declares. “The worst part of holding the memories is not the pain. It’s the loneliness of it. When you lose a loved one, do you carry a loving memory or a lifelong sadness? I want to bring this film to those who suffer the same way. I want people to see Wandering Memories as a way to heal from their own respective pain. If you could not accept the death of a loved one, what would you do?”