This fall the Crocker Art Museum will host a daylong festival of contemporary films by female directors exploring the roles of Japanese and Japanese American women. Held to coincide with the Crocker’s exhibit of contemporary ceramics by Japanese women, Soaring Voices, the festival will include four film screenings at the Guild Theater, located at 2828 35th Street, on Saturday, October 17. Local filmmakers, artists and scholars will introduce and offer insight on each film.

“Soaring Voices tells the story of Japanese women breaking into the male-only ceramic world, and these films expand on that story by looking at the position of women in Japanese society as a whole,” commented Christian Adame, manager of life-long learning at the Crocker Art Museum.

The festival will kick-off with a screening of From a Silk Cocoon at 9:30 a.m. Woven through censored letters, diary entries and haiku poetry, this documentary recounts the story of a Japanese American couple whose shattered dreams and forsaken loyalties led them to renounce their American citizenship while held in American internment camps during World War II. Local director Satsuki Ina will introduce the film.

Wool 100% will start at 11 a.m. Combining live action, puppetry and animation, this drama is about two aging women who live a solitary life collecting discarded items from a nearby town. One day they return home to find a young girl knitting a red sweater in their house. Each time the girl finishes her sweater, she mysteriously unravels it and starts again. Classical pianist Natsuki Fukasawa will introduce this film, directed by Mai Tominaga.

In Shinjuku Boys, showing at 1 p.m., directors Kim Longinotto and Jano Williams explore the complexity of female sexuality in Japan today. This film introduces three “onnabes,” women who live as men but do not usually identify as lesbians. All three, who work as hosts at the New Marilyn Club in Tokyo, talk frankly to the camera about women, sex, transvestitism and lesbianism. Cindi Sturtz Sreetharan, Ph.D., assistant director of the Asian Studies Program at Sacramento State will introduce the film.

Starting at 2:25 p.m., Sacramento Area Youth Speaks will perform original works and recitations based on the Soaring Voices exhibit.

The final film, K-20: Legend of the Mask, will be screened at 2:45 p.m. Director Shimako Sato combines a top cast with stunning visual effects to depict a story of a Ninja-like thief who lives in a very different version of 1949 Feudal Japan, where World War II never happened. This film will make its Sacramento premiere at the festival. Jenny Stark, associate professor of film and video at Sacramento State, will introduce the film.

Guests can mingle with speakers during the festival’s after party starting at 5:30 p.m. at nearby 40 Acres Art Gallery.

All day passes to the festival are $10 for Crocker Art Museum members, $15 for nonmembers and $12 for students and seniors. Light fare and refreshments will be available for purchase. Festival goers are invited to attend a pre-festival tour of Soaring Voices on Friday, October 16 at 4 p.m. This Festival is supported by VIZ Pictures, Inc., Cinema Epoch and Women Make Movies.
Reservations are required by October 14. To register for one or more films, call (916) 808-5499 or email education@crockerartmuseum.org. Passes will be available for purchase at the door. Visit crockerartmuseum.org/film for more information.