Guests 2013-2019

Naoko Nobutomo
Director

Naoko Nobutomo was born in 1961 in Kure City, Hiroshima. After graduating from The University of Tokyo in 1984, she started her career in film production and went on… Read More

Miyuki Tokoi
Director

Miyuki Tokoi graduated from International Christian University in Tokyo with a communications degree and she joined the music business as a director of Western music at a record company…. Read More

Masato Harada
Director

Japanese director Masato Harada studied filmmaking in London and worked as a film critic in Los Angeles before he made his 1979 directorial debut Goodbye Flickmania, a Howard Hawks homage… Read More

Kaori Momoi
Actress / Director
As the leading actor of Japan, Kaori Momoi has appeared in over 60 films, and is the most awarded actress in Japan, including an Academy Award of Japan. She has appeared in Akira Kurosawa’s Kagemusha… Read More

Yui Kiyohara
Director

Born in Tokyo in 1992. She completed a master’s programme in Directing at the Graduate School of Film and New Media, Tokyo University of the Arts, where Director Kiyoshi Kurosawa was her mentor… Read More

Ryota Nakano
Director

Kyoto-born Ryota Nakano studied filmmaking at the Japan Institute of the Moving Image before directing several short films, including The Sparkling Amber. His feature film debut Capturing Dad… Read More

Sang-il Lee
Director

Sang-il Lee, a Japan-born Korean film director and writer, is probably most well-known as the director of Hula Girls, based on the true story of coal miners’ daughters in a small village in northern Japan… Read More

Kaori Momoi
Director / Actress

As the leading actor of Japan, Kaori Momoi has appeared in over 60 films, and is the most awarded actress in Japan, including an Academy Award of Japan. She has appeared in Akira Kurosawa’s Kagemusha… Read More

Shunji Iwai
Director

Iwai was born in Sendai City, Miyagi Prefecture in 1963, and began directing TV, Music Videos and Film in 1988. His distinct directing style has since been coined the “Iwai Aesthetic.” In 1995, his film, Love Letter became a huge hit… read More

Ryusuke Hamaguchi
Director

Director Ryusuke Hamaguchi was born on Dec 16, 1978. After graduating from the University of Tokyo with a Bachelor of Art in Aesthetics in March 2003, he had been working as an assistant directors for film and TV industry for three years… read More

Tadanobu Asano
Actor

In 2003, he received the Upstream Prize for Best Actor at the 60th Annual Venice Film Festival for his role in the arthouse film Last Life In The Universe directed by Pen-Ek Ratanaruang. He later portrayed a young Genghis Khan in Sergei Bodrov… read more

Ken Ishii
DJ

Pioneering producer, world-renowned DJ and true Nippon national treasure, Ken Ishii needs no introduction. With no more than a demo and a string of 12″es under his belt, the Japanese techno originator played his firstever live set in front of… read more

Koji Morimoto
Animator

Born December 26, 1959 in Wakayama Prefecture. Supervisor and founder of Creative Team ｐｈｙΦ. He is best known for his works, MAGNETIC ROSE from anime trilogy MEMORIES, EXTRA , Animatrix, and Dimension Bomb. He received… read more

TOKYO GIRLS’ STYLE
Dance & Vocal Group

Formed in 2010, TOKYO GIRLS’ STYLE is a dance and vocal group consisting of 5 teenagers, Aya Konishi, Miyu Yamabe, Hitomi Arai, Yuri Nakae and Mei Shoji. In 2011, only one year after their debut, this young girls’ group (average age 15) held… read more

Mitsutoshi Tanaka
Film Director

Born in 1958 in Hokkaido, he joined Dentsu Eigasha (now Dentsu Tec) upon graduation from Osaka University of Arts, making TV commercials for TV Man Union before establishing Creators’ Union Co. in 1984. As a director of TV commercials… read more

Yûki Furukawa
Actor

Born in 1987 Tokyo, Yûki moved to Canada at the age of 7. After graduating junior high school, he moved to America to enter a high school in New York and return to Japan at the age of 19. Yûki was a student at Keio University, faculty of Science… read more

Kyohei Sakaguchi
Architect, Writer, and Artist

Born 1978 in Kumamoto, Japan. He studied architecture and graduated from Waseda University. While a student at Waseda, he began to question the ways of modern architecture and researched buildings and gardens created by… read more

Miwa Nishikawa
Director of Dreams for Sale

Born 1974 in Hiroshima, Japan. While attending college, she worked as a production staff for Director Hirokazu Koreeda’s Wonderful Life (1999). In 2002, she made her directorial debut with the film Wild Berries (Hebiichigo). In 2006… read more

Shinsuke Sato
Director of Library Wars

Born 1970 in Hiroshima, Japan. In 1993, while attending Musashino Art University, he wrote the screenplay and directed the 16mm short film Ryonai Genshuku, which won the Pia Film Festival 1994 (PFF94) Grand Prize. This led to… read more