This was one of my favourite films and damn it – also Japanese. However in this case it focusses on a Canadian artist and immigrant to Japan. David Bull is the artist who became intrigued with the ancient art of Japanese woodcuts or Ukiyo-e. This is a complex but beautiful art form that is in decline as modern techniques have changed how artists work around the world. Bull is one of a very few remaining woodcut artists in Japan and he is looking for ways to increase interest in the art form and maintain its traditions. As part of this he partners with a younger American artist who also had an interest in the techniques. Jed Henry is the American living in Utah and two communicate primarily through Skype. Jed is an artist interested in creating images of comic book heroes and works with manga and anime styles common to Japan. He creates the images and David Bull creates the woodcuts to reproduce them in the traditional style. While following their story we learn much about woodcutting style, its limits and its qualities. We also see how these two artists have created a successful market for this traditional Japanese art form blending it with modern popular images. You can find their work and order it if you like at their website: http://ukiyoeheroes.com/

I recommend a visit – it’s a great site and the images are beautiful.

Another Japanese film and Japanese director. Not sure how this happened but I was not disappointed in any of them. This time a documentary about food, really good food. Ramen is a noodle based food that might be called the poutine of Japan. We are introduced to the current leading Ramen chef in Japan, Osamu Tomita. He has one the top prize for ramen restaurants in Japan four years in a row. We are taken into his kitchen and restaurant to learn the secrets of great ramen. We learn that this is a blending of carefully prepared noodles with just the right texture and flavourful stocks made from a variety of different ingredients. Trust me, you don’t always want to see the ramen stock being prepared but trust me, the chefs take this very seriously and the variety of styles and flavours are critical to success. The ramen restaurants in Japan are small and the queues to get in are, in the case of Osamu Tomita’s restaurant, long and the food in great demand. The whole culture around food and ramen in Japan is unique and there is much to learn. The director was there for a Q and A which was fun but his introduction to the film was best. He told us to sit back and enjoy and if at the end we felt hungry his effort in making the film would have been worthwhile. I can tell you that many in the audience were starving and looking on line for the nearest ramen restaurant.

Have you ever seen the Tom Cruise film Minority Report? The movie is based on a classic Phillip Dick sci-fi story in which police have the ability to predict who will commit crimes and arrest them for a “pre-crime” and punish them. Minority Report finds Cruise caught in this web of surveillance that includes not just predicting who will commit crime but also how this kind of surveillance influences product promotion and involves a total invasion of personal privacy. What this documentary shows us is that we are not all that far from this dystopian world. The online world and computerized products is collecting unlimited information about all of us and we are willing participants as we grant permission for this kind of collection. The data can be mined for any number of purposes and this includes predicting crime even who might commit a crime and where. Police are already using this kind of information to direct their own patrols and investigations. The trouble is that the data used to guide this activity is often flawed. A simple example is when you shoo for a gift for someone on Amazon, something you would never buy for yourself, and find yourself bombarded with ads for similar products for days and weeks afterward. Not too awful but the point is that the data being used to guide ads to you is flawed and incomplete. This becomes more serious when law enforcement uses flawed data to guide its actions. Often this means targeting minority communities and individuals and ignoring other crimes and crime sites. The idea of Driving While Black is a case in point but this film points to even more devious, hidden uses of private data to control our society and our police forces. Again – scary stuff. A really interesting film worth your time.

I think this is one of the most important films at the festival. The movie starts with the recent collapse of Gawker following a successful lawsuit filed by professional wrestler Hulk Hogan. On the surface this was about an invasion of privacy claimed by Hogan when Gawker posted a video of him having sex with the wife of one of his friends. The film takes time to look at the case and exposes how bizarre the whole episode was. Nonetheless Hogan won a huge settlement that send Gawker into bankruptcy. The film then takes a turn. It is revealed that the lawsuit was funded in full by Peter Thiel a billionaire with an axe to grind with Gawker for previous posts. His successful use of Hogan to bring the publisher down is something that the ultra rich can use to shut up or shut down other publications that they may not like. The ability of a free press tp speak truth to power and expose wrongdoing is threatened when those with unlimited financial resources can use that to sue and threaten the press. Trump has recently mused about changing litigation laws in the US to make such lawsuits easier to pursue. The threat to free speech and the 1^st Amendment of the US Constitution is clear and present and well described in this film. More scary stuff which is of course what I love about documentaries.

In the days of Trump this kind of film is imperative to see. Trump is an extreme ranter and joins other right wing, fascist oriented leaders in Western democracies. Meuthen’s Party reveals another sort of right wing leader more in the style of Mike Pence. Meuthen is an economics professor who enters German politics with the leading right wing party. Unlike the more extreme members he puts force a more moderate face, backing off outrageous rhetoric and working to win over more centrist oriented voters. The director gets permission to follow him during his campaign and gives us an inside look at this new kind of right wing politician. Meuthen is successful in overcoming protestors and winning over the votes with a very moderate and rational approach. What changes is when we get to follow him to the party convention where his true political views are revealed to be as odious as any of his more crazed colleagues. It is a very scary film since Meuthen wins and leads his party to a “respectable” result although not to the point of taking power at that time. Democracies must remain on the watch for similar politicians who might reach for power in these tumultuous times.