The Hiroshima International Film Festival’s “Hiroshima EYE” introduces films with a unique perspective of Hiroshima, as a way of promoting the city, and sharing its special nature with the world.

The first selection is the latest work, “The Age of Guilt and Forgiveness, ” from Jun Yang, a Chinese artist based in Vienna, Taipei, and Yokohama. In this film Yang tries to find out what guilt and forgiveness truly mean through the dialogue between two lovers in Hiroshima 70 years after　the World War II. The film explores the ideas of guilt and forgiveness, in the contexts of both personal and national relationships. Yang has dedicated this film as an Homage to Alan Resnais’ “Hiroshima Mon Amour.” This screening will only be the second one in Japan, since its premier at the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo in 2016.

Jean-Gabriel Périot is a French director, who won the Grand Prize in the Art Division of the Japan Media Arts Festival, for “Nijuman no borei (200,000 Phantoms).” His latest work “Sumer Lights” is a French film, which was shot in Hiroshima during 2015. He has visited Hiroshima many times over the years and you can see his dedication to Hiroshima in the film.

Yvonne Ng is a Singaporean director based in New York, who has won significant international awards, including the 2016 Student Academy Award (from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science) for “Cloud Kumo.” Tthe Hiroshima International Film Festival will be the premier screening for this wonderful film. “Cloud Kumo” follows the lives of Satoko Ishii, who suffers terrible aftereffects from the atomic bomb, and her granddaughter, who suffers from genetic defects, inherited as a result of her grandmother’s radiation poisoning. Together, as a family, they stand strong and unswayed by their difficult past and look toward the future with hope and positivity.

Please enjoy these interesting, locally made films by directors with such unique cultural backgrounds, in the “Hiroshima EYE” selection!!