Takeshi Kobayashi

It is only at their sister's and mother's funeral when a woman meets her niece after many years. The niece is now a grown girl. The sister takes on the task of informing the deceased's friends of the death while the daughter cannot bring herself to symbolically accept the demise of her mother. In the midst of all this an old flame messages the sister to say he is still in love with her, but is he messaging the living sister or the dead one?

6.9/10

Swallowtail Butterfly 20th Anniversary concert at Inujima Seirensho Museum as part of Setouchi Triennale 2016

One summer day, 400 goldfish were found in the swimming pool of a secondary school. This is a story about the four 15-year-old girls who put them there.

5.7/10

A postman learns that he doesn't have much time left to live due to a terminal illness. A devil then appears in front of him and offers to extend his life if he picks something in the world that will disappear. The man thinks about his relationships with ex-friends, ex-lovers, relatives and colleagues who will be sincerely sad when he dies.

7/10

Maki Eda (Haruna Kawaguchi) works for an advertising agency at a large company. She is a single and doesn't have good luck with men. She also isn't very good at cooking and likes eating junk food. One day, she meets Nagisa Katayama (Kento Hayashi). He is an art teacher and a vegetarian. Unlike Maki, Nagisa cooks very well. The two people then happen to live together. Maki realizes that she is in love with Nagisa, but Nagisa is gay. Through his cooking, they solve their own problems and become important to each other.

6.1/10

The film "Ever Since We Love", directed by Li Yu, is based on the novel of the same title. The story depicts the life of a medical school student who grows through his experience of love and friendship.

5.1/10

A short film consisting of rotoscoped clips from 'Swallotwail Butterfly,' set to the music of the film's Yentown band

7.6/10
8.8%

A road movie that follows three young men yearning after their ideals.

6.3/10

Troubled high school student Makoto arrives in Tokyo to exact revenge from a past incident. He then falls in love at first sight with Ai (Emi Takei), a daughter raised in a wholesome family. Around Makoto and Ai are Iwashimizu (Takumi Saito), who has feelings for Ai and Gamuko (Sakura Ando), a gang member who eyes Makoto.

6.4/10

Set in Japan in the early 1990s, there's one rising band called LANDS, that is starting to find success amidst a flood of other bands. Asako and Miharu are two Tokyo high school students. When Miharu gives Asako her favorite indie rock band; a LANDS CD, she becomes an overnight fan and sets her heart on the talented guitarist Yukiya. LANDS was formed among friends, but as the band begins to climb the ladder towards major stardom, they get in touch with the dark side of the music industry, discord surfaces, inevitable frictions emerge, and unrequited love strains their friendship, threatening to pull their bonds apart.

6.7/10

In this high school romance Hiro is dismayed to learn her new love Shu will be going away to college in Tokyo. She asks him not to go.

6.4/10

On the first day of school for third-year junior high student Nakahara Sawako (Kitano Kie), her father (Haba Yuichi, Off Balance) announces that he is quitting his teaching position and absolving from all parental responsibilities. For Sawako, this is only the latest episode in her family's parade of problems. Three years ago her father attempted suicide, and since then, things haven't been quite the same, with her mother (Ishida Yuriko, Miracle in Four Days) moving out and her studious older brother (Hiaraoka Yuta, Be With You) giving up school. Amidst the family drama, Sawako finds her own balance, working hard in school and developing a romance with cheerful transfer student Oura (Katusji Ryo, Aegis). But more obstacles lie ahead, changes that will throw her already fragile life further awry.

7.3/10

Charts the troubled teenage years of students Yuichi Hasumi and Shusuke Hoshino, exploring the shifting and complex power dynamics of their relationship against the backdrop of Yuichi's love for the dreamy and abstract music of fictional pop star Lily Chou-Chou.

7.6/10
6.9%

Making-of documentary for Swallowtail Butterfly

Swallowtail Butterfly takes place in an alternate Japan, in a ghetto where immigrants from all over the world have come to live and make their fortune. The city is called Yentown, and it is much like Tokyo. Sixteen-year-old Ageha (Ito), a young girl whose mother has just died, is passed on from person to person until a prostitute named Glico (Chara) finally takes pity on her. Under Glico's care, Ageha has many experiences with the other poverty-stricken immigrants in Yentown. Eventually, due to a sudden twist in fate, the immigrants are given a chance to realize their dreams. But in doing so, they destroy their solidarity, and have to face their problems separately.

7.6/10