The 31st Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF) is pleased to announce that its CROSSCUT ASIA section will focus on Southeast Asian films featuring a rich variety of musical genres, including a rock opera from the Philippines, popular Isan band music from Thailand and Cambodian pop songs, reflecting historical and present-day Southeast Asia. This 5th edition of the section has been programmed in collaboration with the Japan Foundation Asia Center.

 
CROSSCUT ASIA #05: Soundtrip to Southeast Asia
From Filipino maestro Lav Diaz’s rock opera to a new talent’s hip hop masterpiece!
The Japan Foundation Asia Center’s CROSSCUT ASIA series showcases Asian films with a focus on specific countries, directors or themes. Following the first three editions, which featured works from Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia, the fourth edition encompassed a larger area of Southeast Asia, with works from young filmmakers in Southeast Asia recommended by maestros such as Brillante Ma Mendoza (Philippines), Tran Anh Hung (Vietnam) and Apichatpong Weerasethakul (Thailand).
 
This year, CROSSCUT ASIA #05: Soundtrip to Southeast Asia, will showcase films featuring a rich variety of musical genres. One eye-opener in the lineup, Season of the Devil, is the latest film from Filipino auteur Lav Diaz. Diaz was first introduced to audiences in Japan in 2009, when the 22nd TIFF screened his short film Butterflies have no Memories. His subsequent films received much critical attention and many awards from leading festivals, making him one of Southeast Asia’s most notable directors. From What Is Before earned him the Golden Leopard at Locarno in 2014, A Lullaby to the Sorrowful Mystery took the Silver Bear at Berlin in 2016, and The Woman Who Left won the Golden Lion at Venice, also in 2016. Diaz’s must-see new Season of the Devil features a cappella songs that resonate against the black-and-white cinematography. This year’s CROSSCUT ASIA will take the audience on a memorable “sound-trip” across regions and time.
 
Lineup
 
Event reports
 

 
The Japan Foundation Asia Center
jfac.jp
The Japan Foundation is Japan’s principal independent administrative institution dedicated to carrying out cultural exchange initiatives throughout the world. The Asia Center, established in April 2014, is a division within the Foundation that conducts and supports collaborative initiatives with its Asian—primarily ASEAN—counterparts. Through interacting and working together in Japanese-language education, arts and culture, sports, and grassroots and intellectual exchange, the Asia Center pursues to develop the sense of kinship and coexistence as neighboring inhabitants of Asia.