JAPANESE FILM SCREENINGS @ PUBLIKA’S MONDAY MOVIES

The Japan Foundation, Kuala Lumpur together with Publika would like to present Japanese Film Screenings at Publika’s Monday Movies! As an effort to bring more films to more places, reaching out to more people, we will be screening a movie every Monday night for the month of January.
Admission is free!
Bring along family and friends for a fun night out and a change from your usual routine!

MOVIE SYNOPSIS:
The Chef of South Polar      (OKITA Shuichi /2009/125 min)

In 1997, an 8-man research team arrived at Dome Fuji Station in Antarctica. The station is 1,000km away from the Antarctic coast. No animals and no virus can live there… Mr. Nishimura is the chef for the team. He misses his family in Japan, but he tries to make a delicious meal to make the members happy every day. The Captain of the team is addicted to ramen, the doctor tries to train to participate in a triathlon when he returns to Japan, and the young support member likes a telephone operator whom he has never met before… Various unique people have to live together for one and a half years. What will their curious lives be in the South Pole?

KOMANEKO – The Curious Cat –   (GOHDA Tsuneo/2006/60 min)

©TYO/dwarf・Komaneko Film Partners

[The First Step] One sunny day, female kitten Koma decides to make a stop motion film. She begins to write the storyboards, make the stuffed toys, and draw the background art. Before long, Koma starts making her film — shooting frame by frame with her cute 8mm camera, and carefully checking each frame. But her shooting is interrupted by an obnoxious fly, resulting in an unexpected accident. Will she be able to complete her project?
[Hands on Camera] Koma adores working with her old 8mm camera, which is ancient but reliable. As she continues shooting her project, Koma encounters a strange creature.
[Koma and Radi-bo] Radi-bo and his father Radi-papa come to Koma’s house to fix a broken radio. What results is Koma’s first encounter with the irritable Radi-bo and how they become friends.
[Radi-bo’s Battle] Radi-bo is flying his radio-controlled model plane when a bird attacks it. The model crashes to bits and Radi-bo vows to get revenge. But his plot against the bird ends with the two adversaries becoming friends.
[Real Friends] While out on a picnic one day, Koma encounters a strange creature. Naturally, she is quite startled at first, but after she realizes that it returned a stuffed toy that she had lost, Koma is no longer afraid of the strange creature. This wonderful episode shows the importance of being oneself and not judging people by their appearance.

Haru’s Journey  (KOBAYASHI Masahiro/2012/134 min)

©2010 HARU’S JOURNEY FILM PARTNERS / LATERNA / MONKEY TOWN PRODUCTIONS. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

This is a story of an elderly fisherman Tadao and his granddaughter Haru who lives in a small fishing village in Hokkaido. One day, Haru loses her job and decides to move to Tokyo with her grandfather where there are better job opportunities. But her grandfather refuses, and so begins the search for another family member who would stay with him in Hokkaido.
The two of them set off on a journey to Honshu to see whether one of Tadao’s siblings will look after him when Haru goes to Tokyo…
A delicate boned fraught with themes of eternal through the struggle for life and the journey of two people, spelled compelling warmth and harshness of life, of “what is to live”, this film is an original authentic Japanese film.

ROBO-G  (YAGUCHI Shinobu /2011/111 min)

©2012 FUJI TELEVISION, TOHO, DENTSU, ALTAMIRA PICTURES

Consumer electronics company employee Kobayashi  is ordered to develop a bipedal robot, but fails miserably. He comes up with a plan to pass off a human in a suit as a robot, and finds an elderly man named Suzuki who fits inside the suit perfectly, but…