Shorts: YAMAMURA Koji
A Child's Metaphysics
Director: YAMAMURA Koji
2008, Animation Division, 5'08''
Excellence Prize, 12th Japan Media Arts Festival
© Yamamura Animation
A head full of figures, a zipped up mouth inside a zipped up mouth, a spooling face, two eyes supported by fish. In distorting children's bodies, YAMAMURA skillfully captures their mode of life. This is a philosophical ‘YAMAMURA world' that humorously and satirically depicts contemporary conditions surrounding children.
Man and Whale
Director: YAMAMURA Koji
2008, Animation Division, 2'03''
Jury Recommended Works, 12th Japan Media Arts Festival
© GREENPEACE JAPAN
This short animation is a simple elegantly told story about a school principal and his students who help rescue a whale caught up on the shore.
Franz Kafka's A COUNTRY DOCTOR
Director: YAMAMURA Koji
2007, Animation Division, 20'57''
Excellence Prize, 11th Japan Media Arts Festival
© Yamamura Animation / SHOCHIKU
A short animation based on the novel A Country Doctor by Franz Kafka. A hapless country doctor describes with breathless urgency a night-time summons to attend a young patient. Events soon take on a surreal aspect.
The Old Crocodile
Director: YAMAMURA Koji
2005, Animation Division, 13'
Excellence Prize, 9th Japan Media Arts Festival
© Yamamura Animation
An old crocodile lying by the Nile has lived for hundreds of years and suffers from rheumatism which has made it difficult for him to move; he is seen as a burden by his clan. One day, he suddenly conceives a trip to search for a place to live.
Mt. Head
Director: YAMAMURA Koji
2002, Animation Division, 10'
Excellence Prize, 6th Japan Media Arts Festival
© Koji Yamamura / Yamamura Animation,Inc.
YAMAMURA eschews the ‘superflat' look favored by popular Japanese animation, preferring his work to bear the marks of his somewhat rough-hewn style. In Mt Head, a stingy man eats a cherry pip, and a cherry tree suddenly sprouts and grows atop his head. Under the flurry of its blossoms, an absurd comedy of modern Japan is played out - a commentary on identity, one's relationship to society, and the eternal question of how the world is organized.
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