News

The Nasu Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia 2007 began on July 17th and came to a close today.  All throughout Nasu there were SSFF banners adourned across the streets along with fliers placed along all the roads　and It looked amazing combined with all the trees and the fog.  Despite the bad weather SSFF Nasu did very well with large audiences turning up for all the screenings.  Today the festival closed with the Nasu Awards 2007 which awards 300,000 yen to the winner of the Best Short Award presented by the Mayor of Nasu.  The Nasu Awards ceremony had four jury members: Naoki Nago a film director who made the film “Argentine Baba”, Ei Mori who is a novelist, Kazuhiro Yamamoto who is a Professor of Art and a critic and finally our very own Seigo Tono the Director of SSFF&ASIA.  The award for Best Short went to “Yawarakana Kanshoky(Soft Touch)” Dir. Sendai Rose and the Audience Award went to “Tobenai Tori (Bird Who Can’t Fly)” Dir.
Takashi Sugita which was a cute CG movie with a powerful environmental message.  The Nasu SSFF was a wonderfully organized and operated event and had a wonderful staff of local volunteers and they employed a truly wonderful promotion of banners and chirashi flyers to.  There was also support from the local medias who would attend and cover some of the events.
Thank you so much to everyone who participated in and attended SSFF Nasu, we hope to see you all again next year!

The Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia 2007 screenings in the beautiful and rustic Nasu began on July 17th.  Nasu's screenings were shown in various unique locations including a large wooden chapel surrounded by a forest at the Hotel Epinard Nasu.  Today there were some wonderful screenings and despite the rain large numbers of people came to enjoy the films.  Tomorrow is the last day of SSFF Nasu and there will be a big award ceremony to celebrate the achievements of the films and their creators.

The Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia National Tour continues onto Hiroshima! SSFF is honored to be able to show our films to the people of this historical town.

The screenings took place in the middle of the bustling streets of downtown Hiroshima on the 8^th floor of DeoDeo.

Audiences were able to enjoy an array of the latest short films from around the world.The Special Programs, which are made up of films that received awards at Short Shorts in Tokyo included Orizuru, a film about the tragic events that took place in Hiroshima during World War II. Its war-related theme hit close to home for some audience members here.

The Children’s Program has a wonderful selection of feel-good short films for the whole family.  

If you missed today’s screenings, not to worry! They will continue at DeoDeo until Sunday, July 29th and at Marina Hop from July 26-29^th. So if you’re looking for a place to spend the day away from the scorching sun or if you just want to watch some great short films, head to DeoDeo or Marina Hop and enjoy the show!

As the Nasu screening is finishing up, SSFF & ASIA 2007 National Tour is moving on to Hiroshima starting from July 21st .

<SSFF & ASIA 2007 Special Screening in Hiroshima>
Dates:
a) 7/26 Thu. - 7/29 Sun.
b) 7/21 Sat. - 7/29 Sun.
Venues:
a) Special Location : HIROSHIMA FESTIVAL OUTLETS
MARINA HOP
4-14 Kanon-Shinmachi Nishi-ku Hiroshima-city Hiroshima
b) Special Location : DEODEO 8F
2-1-18 Kamiya-cho Naka-ku Hiroshima-city Hiroshima
For Inquiries
Committee for Short Shorts in Hiroshima : 082-230-1033

<HIROSHIMA FESTIVAL OUTLETS MARINA HOP>
MARINA HOP is a big seaside mall. There will be a big movie screen and a stage set up at its huge parking lot for the special screenings. There will also be food stands surrounding the stage and you can watch short films while enjoying food and drinks! It will definitely give you a festive summer feeling.
 
For more information on National Tour:
http://www.shortshorts.org/2007/en/tour-japan-2.html

SSFF is establishing a whole new competition, "Stop! Global Warming Competition", and film entries submitted under this category must deal with issues of Global Warming.

We strongly believe in the strength and advantage of digital media and by combining these elements it is possible to help the world and increase awareness of the serious problem we are facing, Global Warming.

For this year's Award Ceremony, the President of Ministry of Environment made a passionate speech on stage that he hoped that establishing a new competition category with SSFF & ASIA would address people all over the world and the crucial issues that need to be discussed.

You can read more about the ceremony on Team -6% HP at http://www.team-6.jp/ .

We will start accepting submissions for SSFF&ASIA2008 from Aug. 1st and the submission guideline will be available online around the same time.

Today is the opening day of the SSFF & ASIA 2007 Special Screening in Nasu. There were pre-screenings from July 14th to 16th and the actual festival started today. All of the award winning short films from SSFF & ASIA 2007 and some special programs including German and Academy programs will be shown. Please check the outline below and come join us for the festivities that are going around the town of Nasu!

<Outline>
July 17, Tue - July 22, Sun (3 venues)
Minamigaoka Dairy
579 Yumoto Nasu-machi Nasu-gun Tochigi
Hotel Epinard Nasu
1 Takaku-hei Nasu-machi Nasu-gun Tochigi
Genrakutei
1147-101 Takaku-hei Nasu-machi Nasu-gun Tochigi

July 18, Wed - July 22, Sun
Nasu Cultural Center
2567-10 Terako-otsu Nasu-machi Nasu-gun Tochigi

<For inquiries>
Committee for Short Shorts in Nasu：0287-62-6135
http://www.ssff-nasu.jp

For more information on the National Tour:
http://www.shortshorts.org/2007/en/tour-japan-2.html

One of our festival sponsors, MoviePlus (Japanese movie channel) is hosting a Special Program for SSFF & ASIA 2007. The program contains exclusive footages from the festival venues and various ceremonies, guest interviews and much more!

At the end of the program, 3 excellent short films that won the Best Short Award from this year will be fully shown.

<O.A. dates>
7/16 23:00, 7/21 13:30, 7/24 15:00, 7/26 23:00, 8/1 19:15

* On July 16th and 26th, Hiroyuki Nakao's "THE SECRET SHOW" will be aired at 0:45.

Following the main festival in Tokyo, the Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia 2007 National Tour will begin with Nasu, Tochigi pref. from June 17th!

Nasu welcomes its 2nd year as host SSFF & ASIA and Committee for Short Shorts in Nasu and volunteers are currently busy with all the preparations hoping for a more successful festival than the last year. This summer it will definitely make your trip to Nasu more fun and memorable to participate in the festival so we hope to see you there!

 <Outline>
July 17, Tue - July 22, Sun  (3 venues)
Minamigaoka Dairy
579 Yumoto Nasu-machi Nasu-gun Tochigi
Hotel Epinard Nasu
1 Takaku-hei Nasu-machi Nasu-gun Tochigi
Genrakutei
1147-101 Takaku-hei Nasu-machi Nasu-gun Tochigi

July 18, Wed - July 22, Sun
Nasu Cultural Center
2567-10 Terako-otsu Nasu-machi Nasu-gun Tochigi

<For inquiries>
Committee for Short Shorts in Nasu：0287-62-6135
http://www.ssff-nasu.jp

For more information on the National Tour:
http://www.shortshorts.org/2007/en/tour-japan-2.html

SSFF & ASIA 2007 has come to its end on July 2nd with the Award Ceremony. From July 16th, SSFF & ASIA 2007 will be touring around in Japan starting from Nasu (Tochigi prefecture). After Nasu, the festival will take a trip to Hiroshima, Okinawa, Nagoya and Osaka.

For more information on the National Tour, please check the below link:
http://www.shortshorts.org/2007/en/tour-japan-2.html (English)

This year, the National Tour will present the award winning short films from SSFF & ASIA 2007 and some special programs including Academy Program. It will be a great opportunity to explore the world of excellent short films, so don't miss it!

SSFF & ASIA 2007 has come to its end! We would like to show our appreciation to those who came to show their support for our festival and the huge crowds of short film fans who enjoyed the festival. Invited filmmakers were all pleased to see the reactions from the audiences and said it has been a great experience participating to the festival.

We would also like to thank our volunteers and interns who put their hard work in to the success of our festival. Everything came together so nicely and we had a great festival.

SSFF & ASIA 2007 will travel around Japan to introduce the world of short films, starting off with Nasu (Tochigi prefecture), and go on to Hiroshima, Okinawa, Nagoya and Osaka. So please make sure to check out the tour as well!

In addition, we are now preparing for next year and we will start with collecting film submissions starting in August 2007. The submission guideline will be available on our website around the same time.

So, see you all at SSFF & ASIA 2008!