Due to the coronavirus pandemic, Director Kiyoshi Kurosawa, winner of the Silver Lion for best director for "Spy no Tsuma" (Wife of a Spy) at this year's Venice International Film Festival on Sept. 12, did not visit Venice, Italy, to attend the awards ceremony. Instead, he held an online press conference from the office of a film distributor in Tokyo the following day and talked about the joy he felt in receiving the award.
"When I learned [our film] might get an award, I thought it might be the Best Screenplay award. The screenplay was great enough to make me think that," Kurosawa said.
The screenplay was coauthored by Ryusuke Hamaguchi and Tadashi Nohara, both of whom Kurosawa taught at Graduate School of Film and New Media, Tokyo University of the Arts. Kurosawa has been teaching as a professor at the university since 2005. He said the story is completely original and has no models.
"When they presented me with the plot, which was before it was in a screenplay format, I thought it was really interesting and wanted to shoot it right away," said Kurosawa. "My involvement in the screenplay was even less than 20%, and I was just one of the pieces being moved how they wanted."
The film depicts the enduring love of a married couple, one of whom is suspected of being a spy during World War II, with many aspects of suspense and melodrama. This is a film typical of the director, who pursues both social aspects of how individuals should be in wartime and an entertaining aspect.
"I love genre films, and that's what I've done with this. If that part of my work is appreciated, then I believe the path I've been following is not a mistake," said Kurosawa. "There're many masters of genre films in the history of cinema, and I hope I can get as close as possible to them in the future."
In the online press conference, Kurosawa was also asked about the fact he has been producing a series of films with female leads in recent years. Among such films are the latest award-winning film, "Kishibe no Tabi" (Journey to the Shore), "Sanpo suru Shinryakusha" (Before We Vanish) and "Tabi no Owari Sekai no Hajimari" (To the Ends of the Earth).
In response, Kurosawa said: "I was struck by the depth of Japanese actresses when I first worked with Yu Aoi, who plays the lead role in a drama series 'Shokuzai' (Atonement), which portrays five women and was broadcast in 2012. That may have had an effect on me."
Meanwhile, regarding winning an award without having attended the awards ceremony, Kurosawa said, "The award ceremony there [in Venice] must have been gorgeous and [attending] it would most certainly have been memorable." However, he added: "If I had been there, I'd have been absorbed in the hustle and bustle and would not have been able to speak calmly. In retrospect, this may be a memorable experience for me."
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