New feature film with original Screenplay is a tragedy and comedy set in a woman's funeral.
This film depicting the last moments of a woman's life,
is a heavy comedy packed with the largest of irony and love.
The woman Mr.Yokotani loved most in his life and hated most,
his former wife Kaoru suddenly died.
Kaoru left a ending note and testament for Mr.Yokotani.
What is Kaoru ’s testament to him?
It was“Performing Kaoru's funeral!”
NORIKO YUASA
Director, Producer of Film and Drama Series
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PROFILE
With a passion for exploring the boundaries of family through film, Noriko Yuasa creates poignant works using nuances of color and light to portray the dark humor of re-invention. A Director with a background in production and project planning, Ms. Yuasa adapts architectural skills gained whilst completing a BA Course in Architecture at Tokyo Metropolitan University, to film making. This results in care and attention to detail, and effective and exploratory works of art.
STORY
Born in the pretty countryside of Japan’s Okayama Prefecture, Noriko Yuasa pursued an ambition to see the world along a familial and natural path. As her father and uncle worked as plasterers, and as she loved making things, Noriko decided to pursue a degree in architecture at Tokyo Metropolitan University. Sometimes reinvention brings unexpected fortunes though. For a young Noriko, the realities of an imagined life practicing architecture hardly seemed to meet the expectations. While her fellow students embraced the prospects of having decades of architectural work ahead of them, the mere idea appalled this craftsman’s child. Seeing the world meant more than simply moving to Tokyo; there had to be more. Two years into University, the deciding moment came and it came in the form of film. HANA-BI, a remarkable film with a powerful ability to connect viewers on their own terms, changed Noriko’s life. Unable to leave her seat, at that moment she knew that her path to see the world had film-making as its guide. HANA-BI’s pure emotions blew straight into Noriko’s heart, along with a feeling of purpose she could not find in architecture. Moving people through film became her passion.
Finishing the course and attaining the BA in Architecture, Noriko trained as a TV Drama Director for Kinoshita Production. This enabled her to launch a career directing her own films, drawing upon the questions of family and future that colored her youth in a series of powerful and well depicted films. Each of these films explores family as the tiniest collective and asks in its own way, ‘With whom and how should we live until the end of our life?’ Past and future, Noriko’s oeuvre explores answers propositions of how "family" should be, and how interesting even the most constricted situations can be.
Noriko’s tragicomic films have been met with warmth and intrigue. Shibuya HUMAX Cinemas hosted her 2015 theatrical feature film directorial debut nationally across Japan, by screening “Udagawacho de matteteyo (Wait in Udagawacho.).” Her short films, such as“Looking For My Lost Sunflowers”, “Girl, Wavering” have also been embraced globally. “Looking For My Lost Sunflowers” got “Best 40-min Movie Award” at the Fukuoka Independent Film Festival 2014. “Girl, Wavering” got the prize for encouragement at the SKIP city international D-cinema festival 2015, and chosen as the Women’s Showcase Shorts at the Asian Film Festival of Dallas 2017, with "Ordinary Everyday" most recently featured at the 2019 IAWRT Asian women film festival, also particiated Cannes Court Métrage 2018 Short Film Corner. Celebrated for drawing broader social issues from personal relationships, the 6th Nepal Human Rights International Film Festival selected her as jury and participant in 2018. In 2019, the MPA / DHU / TIFFCOM awarded her pitch for “Before the Earth Collapses A Family on Fire”, her original project, the Grand Prix. After that she particiated at The 2019 LATC Global Film & TV Program and American Film Marcket.
"Performing KAORU's Funeral" is her one more project that won the final selection in a pitching contest held in Japan.
And since then she has been working on her feature film project "Performing KAORU's Funeral'' with staff from both Japan and Spain. She is in charge of directing and producing.
The film was selected for the Tokyo Gap-Financing Market (TGFM) within TIFFCOM, a market held in conjunction with the Tokyo International Film Festival in November 2020, and was an international co-production between Japan, Spain, and Singapore with World Sales Company/108 MEDIA. The project was shot in early fall 2022 and completed in 2023. Despite having a special screening at Okayama Merpa, operated by Fukutake Kanko Co., Ltd., it had a long run of over two months, and is now focusing its efforts on international expansion in 2024.
In order to produce the film, she established a limited liability company, PKFP PARTNERS, in March 2021, and he serves as the representative employee.
In January 2024, she participated as a july in the spiritual film section of the Dhaka International Film Festival.
"Performing KAORU's Funeral" is but the important project for Noriko, as she continues to grow artistically to depict the tragicomedy of life through a rich entertainment with a beautiful look.
FILOMOGRAPHY 【Excluding Drama series】
Performing KAORU 's Funeral(2024)
/Feature film 100min
Coming Back Sunny (2020)
/Short film 15min
Stand By You (2019)
/【8K】 Canon Official Short film 6min
Ordinary Everyday(2017)
/ Short film 30min
Nihon wo Yukkuri Hashittemitayo ~Anokonotameni Nihonisshuu
(I tried running slowly in Japan - round about Japan for that girl)(2017)/Amazon Original Series Drama
Girl, Wavering (2015)
/ Short film 20min
Udagawacho de matteteyo(Wait in Udagawacho.) (2015)
/ Theatrical feature film debut 65min
Looking for My Lost Sunflowers (2014)
/ Short film 25min
