During World War II, the Brazilian government forced Japanese immigrants in the port town of Santos to relocate. Looking through a recently revealed list of residents of Santos from those years, director MATSUBAYASHI Yoju discovers that 60 percent were immigrants from Okinawa. In this documentary he pursues the reality of a misdeed shrouded in mystery and investigates the connection between Okinawa and Brazil through immigration.
Tijdens de Tweede Wereldoorlog dwong de Braziliaanse overheid Japanse immigranten uit de kuststad Santos om te vertrekken. Toen regisseur MATSUBAYASHI Yoju een recent onthulde lijst van toenmalige inwoners van Santos bekeek, ontdekte hij dat 60 procent daarvan immigranten uit Okinawa waren. In deze documentaire probeert hij de waarheid te achterhalen van een in mysterie gehulde wandaad, en onderzoekt de connectie tussen Okinawa en Brazilië via immigratie.
After traversing Asia on his own, MATSUBAYASHI Yoju 松林要樹 decided to enroll in the Japan Academy of Moving Images to pursue filmmaking, documentary filmmaking in particular. His documentary project Flowers and Troops, which revolves around former Japanese soldiers in the Thai-Burmese border area, was awarded several Japanese prizes and released in theaters across Japan in 2009. His first feature-length film on the 3/11 Triple Disaster in Japan, Fukushima-–Memories of the Lost Landscape (2011), was shown at festivals across the world, and won the Anthropology and Sustainable Development Prize at the Jean Rouch International Film Festival.
2013 – The Horses of Fukushima 祭の馬
2011 – Fukushima-–Memories of the Lost Landscape 相馬看花 第一部 奪われた土地の記憶
2011 – 311
2009 – Flowers and Troops 花と兵隊
2004 – Dear Respectful Humans 拝啓人間様