As the year-end event of the 2020 Shanghai International Film Festival (SIFF), the fourth Japanese Film Festival kicked off in Shanghai on December 11.

2020 is the year for the "China-Japan Cultural and Sports Exchange Promotion Year" and the Japanese Film Festival is aimed at promoting further development of cultural exchanges between the two countries. Gao Yunfei, director of the Shanghai Municipal Film Bureau, and Akio Isomata, ambassador and consul-general of Japan in Shanghai, attended the opening ceremony and delivered speeches.

The eight films screened at this year's Japanese Film Festival include "Silent Tokyo," "The Brightest Roof in the Universe," "God of Fiction," "From Today, It's My Turn," "Any Crybabies Around?" "A Balance," "Hokusai" and "Hope." The first four were international premieres.

The Japanese Film Festival was founded in 2017 by the Shanghai International Film Festival with years of accumulated international resources. It has been held four times so far and is popular with moviegoers.

According to the planning of the Shanghai International Film Festival team, these new films have a variety of themes and types, which not only presents the latest style of Japanese film creation but also brings a light and shadow feast of Japanese culture for Chinese moviegoers.

Affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, the creators of the films were unable to arrive in Shanghai to communicate with fans face to face. The creators of "Hokusai," "Silent Tokyo," "A Balance," and "Any Crybabies Around?" recorded greeting videos to Shanghai fans.

From December 11 to 20, the Japanese Film Festival will show a total of 18 films in cinemas in Shanghai. After the Shanghai trip, the related screening events of this year's Japanese Film Festival will also be held in Hangzhou city, the capital of east China's Zhejiang Province from December 18 to 27.

(Cover image from Japanese Film Festival)