It might be the smallest of the various Cannes sidebars, but the International Critics Week is nevertheless a force to be reckoned with. Focusing primarily on first and second features by newer filmmakers, directors who received an early jump start in there career include Bernardo Bertolucci, Wong Kar-Wai, Francois Ozon, Jacques Audiard, Leos Carax, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, David Robert Mitchell, Trey Edward Shults, and Julia Ducournau.
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This year’s installment is already underway, and one of the more intriguing entries comes from Japanese filmmaker Katsuya Tomita, whose previous movies “Saudade” and “Bangkok Nites” premiered at Locarno to much acclaim. 59-minute mini-feature “Tenzo,” one of only three Japanese films in the entire festival, marks his first trip to Cannes, and looks to launch Tomita onto his biggest stage yet, and deservedly so.
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The director’s social realist work has tackled issues from globalization to post-colonialism, and “Tenzo” looks at the social crisis in Japan following the tsunami and the Fukushima incident, through the eyes of a Buddhist monk and his former friend, now a construction worker. And Tomita knows a thing or two about blue-collar work: he works by day as a truck driver, using his salary to fund his films, which he often casts with his childhood friends in the central parts.
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Ahead of the film’s premiere early next week, we’re delighted to premiere a short teaser trailer for the movie exclusively. You can watch it below, along with the film’s synopsis and the first images. And if you’re on the Croisette, be sure to check the movie out.
Two young monks,Chiken and Ryugyo, return to their temples – one to Yamanashi and the other to Fukushima – after completing their training apprenticeship at the dojo of the Soto Buddhist school. Ten years later, facing the post-Fukushima socio-economic crisis, both monks, under different guises, have taken on more of a community role. Chiken volunteers on a suicide prevention hotline through his temple in Yamanashi and has learnt through his religion that the synchronicity of food and nature can have a positive impact on his family’s health. Ryugyo’s family and temple were devastated by the tsunami, and he himself is still haunted by this tragedy. He comforts victims living in temporary shelters and helps clean up the debris as a construction worker.
