Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on September 2013
Autumn is the season for reading in Japan (see our Autumn Reading List), and Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com) celebrates with a program of movies based on literary masterpieces, through October 4. Bookish films include The Tin Drum (1979; pictured) and The Conformist (1970).
Dance and film fans alike won’t want to miss the international coproduction Tango Libre, which opens September 28 at Human Trust Cinema Yurakucho (2-7-1 Yurakucho, Chiyoda-ku ; www.ttcg.jp). It tells the story of a lonely prison guard who realizes a woman in his tango class has a husband in the clink, then he plots an elaborate dance step to freedom.
After a decade working in the States with films in English such as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Be Kind Rewind, director Michel Gondry has returned to his native France (and Français) for Mood Indigo, screening from October 5 at Shinjuku’s Wald 9 (3-1-26 Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku; www.wald9.com). It’s a fantasy tale of a woman with a rare disease that causes flowers to grow in her lungs—a storyline familiar to Japanese moviegoers as the same novel was turned into the local 2001 film Chloe.
