22nd New York Asian Film Festival

Jul 14-30, 2023

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Photo: ©2022 December Production Committee.

North American Premiere

December

赦し

Katsu (international star Shogen) is a former novelist whose career has stalled since his teen daughter was viciously murdered by a classmate. When he learns that the killer is now being retried since she had been convicted as an adult despite being 17 at the time, he’s enraged. He enlists his ex-wife to cooperate in the prosecution’s efforts to prevent the “monster” from being released from prison early. As the couple embarks on an agonizing moral journey, they are forced to confront not only their own past mistakes, but difficult questions of punishment, the thirst for vengeance and the price of forgiveness — especially when surprising facts are revealed. This riveting courtroom drama, written and directed by non-Japanese, wrestles with the controversial imprisonment of juvenile offenders and the gray areas of Japan’s criminal justice system, where the conviction rate is 99%. Like his award-winning Kontora, Anshul Chauhan’s new film also explores how we process grief and who deserves redemption.

Director: Anshul Chauhan
Producer: Takahiro Yamashita
Cast: Shogen, Megumi, Kizu Toru, Matsuura Ryo
Languages: Japanese with English subtitles
2022; 99 min.

SCHEDULE:

Monday July 24, 6:00pm
Film at Lincoln Center

Intro & Q&A with director Anshul Chauhan and actor Shogen.

Shogen
尚玄

Okinawa native Shogen was told by producers in Tokyo that he didn't look Japanese enough, so he traveled around the world, working as a model in Paris, Milan and London before returning to Japan in 2004 to pursue acting again. He made his film debut in 2005 with Bloody Snake Under The Sun, shown in competition at the Tokyo International Film Festival. He went on to study acting in New York and to be cast in roles overseas as well as in Japan, amassing a lengthy list of credits in such films as Street Fighter: Assassin's Fist and Death Note, before developing and starring in Brillante Mendoza's 2021 Gensan Punch. He is currently in production on Mendoza’s upcoming Chameleon.

Anshul Chauhan

Anshul Chauhan hails from north India, where he earned an Arts degree before starting his career as an animator. In 2011, he relocated to Tokyo to work on international projects for Polygon Pictures, moving on to OLM Pictures and then Square Enix, where he was involved in such large-scale productions as "Final Fantasy" and Gantz: 0. He founded Kowatanda Films in 2016 to make live-action films. His feature debut was Bad Poetry Tokyo, (2018). In 2020, his Kontora won the Grand Prix awards at the PÖFF International Film Festival, Brussels International Film Festival and Skip City D-Cinema Film Festival, as well as the Obayashi Prize from Japan Cuts in New York. December is his third feature, and was nominated for the Kim Jiseok Award at the Busan International Film Festival in 2022.