Full Steam Ahead

Back from the second leg of the world tour of 'A2-B-C' two nights ago, I had just enough time to grab some clean clothes (and a warmer jacket!) before I took a bullet train yesterday morning to Nagoya for more domestic screenings of the film.

The PIA Film Festival, during which the Japan premier of the 'A2-B-C' was held in September (INFO), goes on tour to cities around Japan with a selection of films from the main program, and this week it is playing in Nagoya (INFO).

There was a great turnout for the screening today which took place at the Aichi Prefectural Arts Centre.  It was wonderful to see festival director Keiko Araki, to whom I am extremely grateful for the support, advice and encouragement she has given to me since the film's world premier in Germany nearly six months ago (INFO).

Perhaps I was more jet-lagged than I realized as during the post-screening Q&A, I was less than articulate at times, and at one point Araki-san even gave me a friendly jab, saying, "What is wrong with you today?"

Following the screening, I was interviewed by a group of students from the Nagoya Visual Arts School for a class project.  It was exactly 10 years ago that I was working on my MA in filmmaking, and seeing this fresh-faced group of young filmmakers in action gave me a wonderful feeling of nostalgia.  

The students asked me if I had any advice for them, and I struggled to give them an answer.  I certainly don't have this "filmmaking thing" all figured out, and I wasn't really sure what to say.  In the end, I simply said, "Listen to the voice in your heart."

In the evening, I had the honour of speaking at Nagoya University at the invitation of Professor Hideaki Fujiki, whom I had the pleasure of meeting during last month's Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival (INFO).  The Visual Studies Network event (INFO) was attended by students from various departments, including film studies and philosophy, as well as several members of the public.

During the interview portion of the event, Professor Fujiki asked wonderful questions that caused me to think about my work in certain ways for the first time.  The floor was then given over to the attendees to make comments and pose questions, and the discussion that followed was lively and eye-opening.

For a filmmaker, there is perhaps no greater honour than to have an audience fully engage with his or her work, and I am extremely grateful for the opportunity that this experience gave me to think about what I do in different ways.

Back on the bullet train this morning, I looked out the window: there was Mt. Fuji steady and still, as each of us, speeding past, headed somewhere.

Bittersweet

At the STEPS Rights Film Festival Awards Ceremony last night, ‘A2-B-C’ was honoured with the award for “Best Documentary”.  I can not describe how immensely humbling it is to receive this recognition from a jury in the Ukraine, the home to Chernobyl and a country that knows all too well the terrible affects of a nuclear accident.  Especially on children.

I said in my acceptance speech that this is not my award; it belongs to the mothers who appear in the film and serves to recocognize their great bravery in speaking out and becoming 'the nail that sticks up' and risks getting hammered down.

The mothers now know that their voices are being heard as far away as Chernobyl, and that soon, the rest of the world, too, will have no choice but to listen.

November 13, 2013 UPDATE:

It is with a feeling of great responsibility that I continue my work continue documenting the issues affecting the children of Fukushima as more cases of thyroid cancer in Fukushima children have come to light today (ARTICLE).

Let them eat cake

On the last day of the STEPS Rights Film Festival in the Ukraine (WEBSITE), a special screening of “Ali'ens: Somalis in transit” (WEBSITE) was held.  The film, about 15 year old Ali as he flees the conflict in Somalia, was produced with the support of The UN Refugee Agency.

The screening, held at a major multiplex cinema, was preceded by an exhibition about foreigners living in the Ukraine, and the entire event, along with a very fancy catered reception, was sponsored by The UN Refugee Agency in Ukraine.

Wine flowed, expensive sweets were passed, and the only meat that I saw during the entire festival was served here.  Although it was not lost on any of the filmmakers or festival staff in attendance, I wonder how many of the picture-posing representatives of the UN saw the irony.

The Meat of the Issue

After the excursion yesterday, Igor drove us through Kharkov, its streets lined with majestic churches and monuments, to "Bommer" (WEBSITE), the oldest cinema in the city and the main venue of the STEPS Rights Festival (WEBSITE).

Once inside the cinema, I received my festival pass and film schedule.  As I admired the original flooring on the staircase, I had that feeling of “going to the movies” that no multiplex could ever reproduce. 

Prior to the afternoon screenings, we were ushered through a film-poster-and-photograph-lined hall on the way to the cinema for a press conference.  It was here that I learned the meaning of the festival title “STEPS”.

Although I had thought that “STEPS” was an acronym, festival president and film director Igor Parfenov, explained that the festival is named for the Leo Tolstoy essay “The First Step” (1892), which depicts the world of slaughter houses and the merits of vegetarianism.  The way Igor described it, the essay sounds much like Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle”, although it was written some fourteen years earlier.

From the packed audience that was assembled, a journalist spoke.  She noted that Mother Theresa had once said that she would not wage war against war as that would only be causing more war***.  The journalist then addressed Igor directly: Is it possible that the often violent and shocking nature of the films presented during the festival might only be multiplying the pain which they depict rather than serve to do anything constructive to stop it?

“Blood,” Igor replied, “has a beautifying, cleansing effect.”

Each of the film directors in attendance had their turn in the firing line, but it was perhaps because of the terrible kinship between Fukushima and Chernobyl that the only fire aimed at me was friendly.

A reception was then held in the cinema lobby where Ukranian wine from the Crimea region and small open-faced sandwiches on rich homemade bread were served. 

Igor, a kind and attentive host, noticed I wasn’t eating.  Glancing at the cheese and meat sandwiches, I apologized and explained that I am a vegetarian.

“Do you really think that I would serve meat?!  Did you listen to anything I just said at the press conference?!” Igor roared with a smile as he shoved a tray of sandwiches into my face.  “Eat!  This isn’t even real cheese.  It’s all vegan.”

Immediately following the reception, the screening of ‘A2-B-C’ (WEBSITE) was held.  The audience was rustling in their seats and talking throughout the film.  Convinced that it was not going over well and unable to gauge the audience’s reaction as I couldn't understand what they were saying, I kept turning to Alina, my minder and interpreter, and asking what was wrong.  “They’re OK,” she said.  “Stop worrying.”

Following the screening, person after person came up to greet me.  “Thank you for making this,” one young man said.  “We had no idea this was happening again.”
______________________________________________________________________________

*** note: I have tried unsuccessfully to find this quote, which was paraphrased by a Ukrainian journalist and translated into English by a simultaneous interpreter.

Righting Wrongs

I flew into Kharkov, Ukraine, last night after spending the day outside Kiev.  STEPS Rights Film Festival (WEBSITE) president and film director Igor Parfenov, accompanied by translator and festival staff member Alina, met the visiting filmmakers this morning at our hotel in his tank of a car for what would only be described to us as an “excursion” before the film screenings scheduled in the afternoon.

This excursion began with the compulsory sites that one sees in any city in Europe: the monuments and public squares dedicated to important authors and historical-- often war-- figures as well as noted buildings.  One such building (BELOW) is a modern structure that has stood as the tallest building in Kharkov, yet it is not only this that makes it so unique: the points and angles of the structure are patterned after a music score that when played, sounds out the most popular worker’s party anthem (!).

Igor then led us through a large, beautiful park and explained that we were heading for the zoo.  I must admit that I have a problem with zoos, especially small ones that tend to be under-funded and often keep the animals in tiny, unclean enclosures.

Alina told us the history of the zoo, which was established in the late 1800’s.  As we entered the zoo gates, Igor quietly added “I don’t like zoos.”

He explained that although he doesn’t approve of zoos and how the animals are often kept, they are a necessary evil.  Igor told us that many of the animals here, for example, have been rescued from circuses or private owners that shouldn’t have been keeping them in the first place.  Without someone to care for them, the animals would have been destroyed.

As he talked, Igor was holding a large string of smooth stones that he moved through his fingers one-by-one, and I wondered if it was a massive rosary.  Perhaps he had noticed me looking at them as he suddenly remarked to our group “these are not religious”, although he never did explain what they were.

Igor stopped in front of a grand bull.  A smile on his face, Igor proudly introduced us to one of his film stars.  This bull was featured in Igor’s film "A Farewell to the Bullfight" (WEBSITE), which is based on the Jack London novel "The Madness of John Harned".  Igor’s films (FILMOGRAPHY) combine elements of fiction and documentary and always address some issue of rights, whether animal or human, and often both at the same time. 

As we continued through the zoo, seeing larger and larger animals caged, the heavy beads in Igor’s hand moved faster and faster through his thick fingers.

Igor ushered us into the monkey house and then fell silent.

Coming up behind us, he quietly whispered to Alina and me, “Come with me. But just the two of you.”

Igor led us through a gate marked “closed” to a back stairwell that went up to the second floor of the ancient monkey house.  Beyond a cluttered office was a room that was taken up almost entirely by a large cage.  We followed Igor in.

Signaling for us to stay back, Igor approached the bars.  “This is Nika, " he said, as Alina and I stood still and witnessed two old friends greeting each other.  

  

From what little Igor said, I gathered that Nika was being kept separate from the others due to some kind of social integration issue.  I wondered to myself how long it would take being confined to a cage such as this for a human to "go crazy".  I don't suppose it would take very long.

We left in silence and joined the rest of the group downstairs.  I couldn’t get out of my head the mountain lions in tight spaces pacing in tight circles, elephants greeting each other through bars, and caged-up monkeys literally bouncing off the walls.

“I don’t like coming here”, Igor said.  “But I must.”

Just as the families with children are compelled to come and watch the animals in the zoo, Igor, a powerful and influential film director, is compelled to come and watch the zookeepers.

Fukushima to Chernobyl and back again

There was a single purpose in coming to Kiev: to visit the Chernobyl museum.  Driving to the museum on the way from the airport, it is clear that one could spend weeks in this gorgeous city with its majestic churches and amazing architecture, and still not be able to see it all.

The Chernobyl Museum (WEBSITE) is located in a former firehouse, although I would have said it had once been a church, even more so after entering.

Once inside, the first exhibition that visitors encounter depicts the nuclear tragedy in Fukushima.  This is where I met Anna Korolevska, the scientific director of the museum.  Anna guided me through the exhibition, drawing connections between the two nuclear disasters of Chernobyl and Fukushima, and why it had been so important to her to create this exhibition.  Some of the exhibition depicts the struggle to maintain festivals and handcrafts from the Fukushima area; this struggle to retain one's cultural identity in the wake of a nuclear disaster is one that continues for the people evacuated from the Chernobyl area.

(A 3D tour of the museum, including the exhibition that was previously displayed in this space, can be found HERE.)

The exhibit about Chernobyl itself is housed on the second floor of the museum and is separated into three main parts.  The first tells the history of the accident, including the story of the "liquidators" and so-called "biological robots", the men who did work in an environment so harsh that even robots could not survive.

In the next room, there are several artistic interpretations of the Chernobyl disaster.  One that particularly struck me was of a withered apple tree, a few photographs clinging to its branches and the rest scattered around its base.  Anna explained that the apple trees, symbols of life, had been destroyed by the radiation, and the photographs represent the lost and misplaced generations of the people from the Chernobyl area.

The affect that the Chernobyl accident has had on the international community is felt in a display that holds messages of support and peace from friends all over the world.  Prominently displayed is a Peace Pole, with the words "May Peace Prevail on Earth", created on initiative from the World Prayer Peace Society in Japan.  It was installed in the museum on the eve of World Peace Day, April 22, 1996.  To the right of it can be seen the display about the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The main exhibition hall feels more like a house of worship than a museum.  There is a peace that is within this space.  When I remarked on this, Anna said that many religious leaders from various religions come to the museum specifically to be in this room to sit and reflect.

I was particularly drawn to the icons that watch over the entrance to this space.  

At the back of this sanctuary is an over-whelming shrine to the children who are the victims of Chernobyl.  The impact of Chernobyl, and of Fukushima, will be felt for generations.

Since the beginning of the disaster in Fukushima, the focus of my work has been on the children.  Before I came to Kiev, I sent Anna a copy of 'A2-B-C'.  She wrote back, accepting my request to meet, and honoured me with the following words about the film:

I was watching the film very carefully, came back and watched some fragments again and again.  I think that your film is very important for the Japanese, and for the citizens of all countries of the world.  This problem has no borders, it is relevant today for all the inhabitants of the planet.

Anna is in the process of planning a new exhibition about Fukushima and has asked for my films and photographs.  It is with great humility that I have gratefully accepted this honour.

Leaving the museum, I walked back through the Fukushima exhibtion and was suddenly struck by a branch of cherry blossoms.  The apple blossoms and the cherry blossoms: both symbols of life and its fragile beauty.  We are the same people, sharing the same planet home.

It is now night at the Chernobyl museum, and a mother and child are keeping watch nearby.