FORM-Idea

By Beverly AndrewsWith not one but two strikes, the Screen Actors Guild as well as the Writer’s Guild, dramatically affecting film productions last year, critics were eagerly anticipating this year’s Sundance festival.  They wanted to see if both strikes, now resolved, would have a dramatic effect on the quality of films shown.  The answer appears to be a resounding no as there is as much buzz around films premiering at this year’s festival as there has been at previous editions.  The beautiful Christopher Reeves’ documentary Super/Man has already been sold to Warner’s Brothers and the noir western Love Lies Bleeding staring Kristen Stewart looks set to become a global hit.However, as always, the real cinematic gems are often not those heralded in the festival’s headlines but rather the small films so easily overlooked by the global media.  Two of my festival favourites fall into this category.  An enchanting environmental animated short Baigal Nuur (Lake Baikal) and a heartbreaking look at the aftermath of a sexual assault in the documentary Black Box Diaries, from Japan.  Both for me are two of the best films I have seen in a very long time.

Black Box Diaries is a documentary which looks at a young Japanese woman’s seven-year fight for justice in a country which until recently didn’t even recognize the absence of consent as legal grounds for a successful rape prosecution. Therefore, Shiori Ito’s seven years long battle was not simply a fight against Japan’s outdated justice system but also a battle against an entire culture, which seeks to protect powerful men.

Ito’s story begins in a public restaurant when as a twenty-five-year-old reporter she accepts an invitation to meet one of Japan’s most celebrated television journalist, Noriyuki Yamaguchi, a friend and biographer of the country’s then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. According to Ito, she immediately felt something was wrong when she arrived and found the meeting was only between the two of them, since she says she was told before that there would also be colleagues present.  She also recounts reacting immediately to a drink she was given which made her feel intoxicated.

According to Ito, she found herself being driven by Yamaguchi’s chauffeur to his hotel despite repeatedly asking to be let out and then literally being dragged from the car into the hotel where Yamaguchi was staying. Ito states that she was raped in his room. Despite existing CCTV footage, from the hotel’s entrance, which appears to substantiate at least part of Ito’s story and two eye witnesses, the chauffeur and the hotel doorman, who also support at least part of the story, the criminal case was dismissed.

What Ito decides to do next though is the crux of the movie.  She launches a civil court case, writes a book about the incident and decides as a journalist to document every step of her journey.  This catapults Shori Ito in to a spotlight, which she did not desire nor was prepared for since in Japan it is seen as shameful to even speak about such events let alone pursue justice.  But Ito’s battle did ultimately have far reaching consequences not just for her but the country as a whole, when many women there started to see her fight as their own.  

Baigal Nuur

A very different film is the enchanting nine-minute short Baigal Nuur – Lake Baikal, this animated short is just a delight as it documents, the formation of Lake Baikal in Siberia, accompanied by the voice of a Buryat woman, who speaks the vanishing Buryat-Mongolian language. The short is a stunning, moving portrait of what will be lost if climate change is not addressed.  In a beautiful, subtle way it makes a very powerful statement about the need for environmental protection.  Taken together these films illustrate how cinematic gems can often be found in unexpected places.