Fukushima, Rokkasho and Message to the Future | 2013
Kei Shimada — director
in Japanese with English subtitles, 105′
 
CRS, Think Act Change NYC, Learn From 3.11, Mar Creation, and Todos Somos Japon (now called Sloths Against Nuclear State) invite you to the NYC premiere of the documentary “Fukushima, Rokkasho and Message to the Future.” This film shows us how the shadowy alliance of the Japanese government and the nuclear power industry have managed to build nuclear installations all over rural Japan to benefit urban Japan and the US military, despite strong opposition from the people living in those communities, and it also shows us the many ways in which the everyday lives of the people in these communities have suffered, sometimes tragically, as a result and how they persevere. They tell their own stories, in their own words, in such a way that their humanity and our complicity in their suffering cannot be marginalized.
 
Following each screening, we will have a conversation via Skype with the director, Kei Shimada and light refreshments will be served. Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 at the door.
The film includes two songs, “Are You Safe Now?” (composed six days after the earthquake) and “Nuchiyui,” sung by the famous Japanese singer and environmentalist, Tokiko Kato, who has served in the past as an ambassador for the World Wildlife Fund and the United Nations Environment Program. See her TEDxTokyo talk about what it means to live with radiation.
 
Director Kei Shimada, 53, is an award-winning photographer who started covering nuclear issues when the 1986 Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine happened. In her fascination, perhaps, she found herself settling in remote Rokkasho village (pop. 11,000) in the northern Aomori Prefecture, where a large nuclear fuel cycle complex stands, the first in Japan that can produce large amounts of weapons-grade plutonium annually, enough to construct up to 2,000 bombs. In 2011, she was getting ready to shoot her first movie featuring Rokkasho, its residents, and how their lives are being affected by the nuclear plant. But, as the Great East Japan Earthquake hit, causing the tsunami that resulted in the nuclear meltdown of the Fukushima Daiichi plant, she was convinced that she needed to add Fukushima in her documentary, now entitled “Fukushima, Rokkasho and Message to the Future.”
Shimada says of her film, “I hope I can show that we can’t coexist with nuclear power and it is the duty of each of us to make a choice about energy in the future.”
Singer Tokiko Kato was born in Harbin in 1943. In 1965, she won the Japan Amateur Chanson Competition and made her debut as a singer while she was an undergraduate at the University of Tokyo. Since then she has had many hit songs and has made more than 70 albums. In addition to dozens of concerts at home, Ms. Kato’s  performances around the world have included Carnegie Hall in New York in 1988 and 1990. In 1992, she received the prestigious Chevalier Medal for Culture from the Government of France for her artistic achievements and cultural activities. Her performances at the Fuji Rock Festival in 2006 and 2011 as well as at the ap bank fes. in 2007 and 2011 obtained great attention for their audience appeal across generations. Besides being active as a singer, Ms. Kato took a turn as an actress in the film Izakaya Choji (1983). And in the animated film Porco Rosso (1992) by Hayao Miyazaki, she displayed her charm as a voice actor.
Ms. Kato is an activist about global environmental issues. Following her appointment as World Wildlife Fund Councilor in 1997, she was named Special Envoy for the United Nations Environment Programme in October 2000. She has traveled extensively throughout Asia and Oceania to spread the word about the actual state of the natural environment that she has personally witnessed, as well as to foster human connections through her music. In April 2008, Ms. Kato reported on her activities as UNEP Special Envoy and performed live at the UN General Assembly Hall in New York City (she resigned from her post of UNEP Special Envoy in March 2011). At home in Japan, Ms. Kato continues her endeavors together with the younger generation toward realizing an eco-friendly society, basing their operations at the “Kamogawa Nature Kingdom” farm in Kamogawa, Chiba Prefecture.
 
Watch trailer
 
Sept 20141211 am & 7 pm