8 November, 2008
ContentFilm International has acquired all International rights to Japan’s official submission for the Best Foreign Language Film for the 2009 Oscars, the award winning DEPARTURES. An emotional, inspiring and often amusing story DEPARTURES has all the ingredients of the next ‘Life is Beautiful’ and has to date recorded 3 million admissions in Japan (US$25 million at the BO) and won Best Film at the Montreal Film Festival this August. US distribution will be announced shortly.
Directed by Yojiro Takita (When the last Sword is Drawn (Best Film at 2004 Japan Academy Awards), and Onmyoji), the film stars Masahiro Motoki (The Bird People in China, Gemini), Tsutomu Yamazaki (Kagemusha, Tampopo), Ryoko Hirosue (Wasabi) and Kimiko Yo (Café Lumière).
DEPARTURES is a beautiful and unusual love story that surprises you with bursts of humour, that moves you with its detail and its humanity – whilst at the same time giving an extraordinary insight into a complex and unique culture. It’s a film that will make you laugh and cry – but above all, leaves you with one overriding feeling… joy.
Produced by Toshiaki Nakazawa (Sinking of Japan, Azumi) and Toshihisa Watai with Yasuhiro Mase (Memories of Matsuko, Secret) acting as executive producer, the film is produced by Departures Film Partners, and distributed by Shochiku Co., Ltd.
Other crew includes Director of Photography Takeshi Hamada (Blood and Bones, Helen the Baby Fox), Music by Joe Hisaishi (Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, Hana-bi), Fumio Ogawa (Silk) is the production designer and Akimasa Kawashima (Genghis Khan – To the Ends of the Earth and Sea) is the editor.
Masaki Koga from Shochiku commented “We are excited to find a great partner such as ContentFilm to be working on the international sales of this wonderful film, which has been successful in Japan and in many film festivals. With working with ContentfFilm, I am sure that it will reach a very wide audience outside of Japan.”
Content’s Carmichael said: “Departures has really taken our breath away. It is a beautiful, tender and thoughtful film. Everyone I know who’s seen it has been very moved – and we’re delighted to be working on it with Shochiku.”
The film had already been sold to Korea (KD Media), Taiwan (Zeus Films), Singapore (Golden Village), Malaysia (Golden Screen Cinema), Australia & New- Zealand (Madman Entertainment), and Greece (Videorama), and Hong Kong..
