Japan, 2013, HD Video, 20min
Featuring
Yosuke Iijima
Mihoko Zurushima
Uedada
Goki Kazama
Amanda Asbury
Mihoko Zurushima
Uedada
Goki Kazama
Amanda Asbury
Produced at Waseda University, School of International Liberal Studies
Special thanks to Rosemarie Bernard, PwC Japan
In 2011, the Japanese word "kizuna(絆) " has been chosen as "kanji of the year", a difficult year dominated by the earthquake and tsunami. In English, the kanji means bonds or connections between people.
Andante: Kizuna was made during my year-long study in Tokyo between 2012 and 2013 for an urban anthropology class. The documentary captured the rigid Japanese "salary-man" work culture and its dominating effects on individuals' personal life and emotional wellbeing, especially at a delicate post natural disaster moment when people -- burdened with collective anxieties -- had started longing for companionship, bonds and support from their personal networks both on the intimate family level and the general societal level.