Competition

A great film combines modernity that reflects the current times and universality that stimulates our artistic sensibility. The Competition line up this year will include mainly fall premiere films which provide excitement and emotion by capturing the psychology of people living in this age.
The collection of 15 films in this section includes premiere screenings of works directed by world renowned directors as well as some created by promising young directors, all competing to be selected as the best of the best. If I were to give a common theme to the films, I would say it is "how an individual can fight against the world": a woman who takes a firm decision to live as a man in a conservative period; a young man who strives to crawl his way up from poverty; a middle-aged man who entrusts his determination to attain peace for the region to a pig… You will come to see the framework of ambiguity in modern society through an individual's prayer or wish in each of these films.
Please find out with your own eyes how these excellent filmmakers use anger, fear, tears and laughter in their works to focus on particular aspects of the world we live in.

Yoshi Yatabe

Programming Director
The 24th TIFF

Special Screenings

The Special Screenings section presents a chance to see films that are not yet on general release. This year's selection includes The Three Musketeers, a big-screen action adventure directed by Paul W. S. Anderson and shot in state-of-the-art 3D, and Moneyball, directed by Bennett Miller and starring Brad Pitt. They have been selected as our official opening and official closing films respectively. In addition to these two high-quality productions, we have also selected 1911, a historical epic starring Jackie Chan, as the special opening film.
It will be the first time since the 10th TIFF in 1997 for us to have two opening films. However, we were eager to accept as many as possible of the wonderful films that were entered from Asia, Europe and the United States; we consider them as a form of thoughtful support for Japan that experienced the terrible natural disaster only a few months ago. That is why we decided to have two opening films this year.
Along with these three films, we are presenting a truly entertaining selection of films from Japan and abroad. We hope that you will visit TIFF to enjoy this collection of excellent films!

Nobushige Toshima

Programming Director
The 24th TIFF Special Screenings Section

Winds of Asia-Middle East

Five years have passed since we used the motto "more widely than ever, stronger than ever!" However, the winds of Asian films continue to blow strongly, and we have once again achieved a collection of many sensational works.
One of the trends in recent years has been an increasing number of films created by a multinational staff and cast, as you will see from our program. And cases in which Japanese literary works have been cinematized by non-Japanese Asian filmmakers, as exemplified by last year's Norwegian Wood, are much in evidence. SHIIKU(Grbierd' Elevage) and TATSUMI are examples of noteworthy films that indicate a new trend linking Asian films and Japan.
We hope you will enjoy a refreshing breeze from the vast Asian region with films made both in neighboring countries in East Asia and countries further away in the Middle East.

Kenji Ishizaka

Programming Director
The 24th TIFF Winds of Asia-Middle East Section

Japanese Eyes

The Japanese Eyes section strongly supports Japanese independent films by presenting their diversity to the world.
This year we will be introducing new films created by four promising Japanese directors: Satoru Hirohara, PFF Award winner who has been recognized by film festivals around the world; Juichiro Yamasaki reflects on his own life as a farmer in his down-to-earth film; Kiyoshi Sugita, who started his career as an assistant director to Kiyoshi Kurosawa and Shinji Aoyama after graduating from the Film School of Tokyo; and Keiichi Kobayashi, with a background as a TV director, who is known for his discerning eye for visuals.
We will also screen films that exemplify the diversity of Japanese films: a documentary film on the world-class ballet dancer Yasuyuki Shuto, directed by Junko Kobayashi; a work co-directed by Nobuhisa Sano and Erlan Nurmuhambetov filmed entirely in the magnificent land of Kazakhstan; and an action horror movie by Takanori Tsujimoto starring Yasuaki Kurata, a Japanese actor popular around Asia.
And we are proud to welcome back Tetsuaki Matsui, the winner of the Japanese Eyes Best Picture Award at the 22nd TIFF, who has fully sublimated his feelings about the devastating disaster in Japan into a film of great depth.

WORLD CINEMA

The WORLD CINEMA section features films that have been popular at international film festivals held this year – such as Sundance, Rotterdam, Berlin, Cannes, and Venice. As a general rule, they are new titles by renowned directors for which the theatrical release in Japan was still undecided as of August 31, 2011. The collection of films is a must-see for film lovers: award-winning films, a controversial film by a unique director, a new work by a promising young director with deep relationship with TIFF…and much more! Since many of the films that were screened in last year's WORLD CINEMA section have later found distributors, this section also plays an important role from the viewpoint of foreign film distribution in Japan. We hope your will enjoy all of these films!

natural TIFF supported by TOYOTA

Introduced at the 21st Tokyo International Film Festival, the natural TIFF section showcases various types of films devoted to the Festival's theme of "Green/Ecology". This year's collection includes hardline works that tackle ecological issues head-on, as well as amusing works that gently raise awareness of how people can coexist with nature or the relationships between nature and our lives. The common concept of all these documentaries and fictional films is "How we should live in relation to nature". Please enjoy these 10 new high-quality films.