With Shoplifters, Hirokazu Kore-eda has found a wider international audience for films already popular in Japan. But he made his first documentary for TV in 1991 and his first fiction feature for the cinema in 1995. What can his early films tell us about how his ideas have developed? Are they very different from the films from 2008 onwards which have been more easily accessible in the UK?
Filmmakers like Kore-eda are often introduced to international audiences in ways that might help them get noticed but can easily become a burden for creative artists whose ideas and and influences may be diverse and complex. In this short season of five films at least one is closely linked to Shoplifters and two others are perhaps very different. But all five display some familiar traits associated with this gifted filmmaker and we’ll try to identify and explore them in this introduction.
In this One Hour Intro, Freelance Film Educator Roy Stafford will explore Kore-eda’s early films and how they relate to contemporary concerns.