Okinawa Saudade Screens at 39th Tokyo Film Fest — SkimNews
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- Okinawa Saudade is screening at the 39th Tokyo International Film Festival’s Nippon Cinema Now selection, following Yumi, a Ryukyu Buyo dancer, and Everton, an Eisa teacher, as they travel from Brazil to Okinawa for an exchange program centered on the island’s history and culture.
- Matsubayashi Yoju said the project grew from his 2016 year in Brazil, when he learned that some 60% of Japanese immigrants forced out in a wartime relocation were from Okinawa; the Brazilian Okinawan community’s training and scholarship exchanges became the project’s starting point.
- Okinawa/Santos drew on a large archive at Bunkyo in São Paulo’s Liberdade district; during filming, community members arranged coordinators and drivers as volunteers and treated Matsubayashi as “Ichariba choodee,” meaning brother and sister.
- Brazil’s Amnesty Commission formally apologized in July 2024 for Brazil’s post-World War II persecution of Japanese immigrants; the director said the timing coincided with planned September training and discussed scholarships for Okinawan Brazilians.
- Yumi practices Ryukyu Buyo; elsewhere, the film treats Creative Eisa—a Brazilian form begun about 45 years ago that does not require the sanshin used in traditional Eisa—as a tradition in its own right, in Matsubayashi’s view.
- NHK paid Matsubayashi about JPY10 million ($63,000) for television work connected to Okinawa/Santos, which he used to create his next film; he says weak currency and smaller NHK budgets have strained the broadcaster and his own finances.
- Okinawa Prefecture provided the grant that made post-production on Okinawa Saudade possible; without it, Matsubayashi says the film could not have reached that stage as Japanese documentaries face difficult funding conditions.
Why it matters: Okinawa Prefecture’s grant was the difference between completing post-production on Okinawa Saudade and not doing it, while the community supplied volunteer coordination and transport. Matsubayashi also says the JPY10 million ($63,000) he earned from NHK television work funded his next-film cycle, but weak currency and smaller budgets now pressure that model.
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