Tokyo Lift-Off Film Festival 2021 - Network Round Shorts

Tuesday 6th July - Tuesday 13th July

1.

Four Goddesses
Dir. Mark Cowan
Japan
Logline: A lighthearted day-in-the-life story of 4 goddesses enshrined in an abandoned Shinto shrine of nearby farming village, whose rapidly aging citizenry rarely visit. The goddesses long to avail themselves of their boredom driven infighting.

2.

For Her
Dir. Valeria Riquelme
Hong Kong
Logline: Jane struggles to write a story about rape but ends trapped in her emotions as she attempts to capture the impossible.

3.

Souls On Hold
Dir. Rachael Baskerville
Australia
Logline: A soul wakes up in a human body, in a clinical environment, unsure as to how they got there. They pick up a phone in the room only to be put on hold by a strange cosmic operator who eventually has to hard sell the concept of life on earth to this perplexed new soul, which on paper, sounds like a total farce.

4.

Breaking Ground
Dir. Jake Villadolid
USA
Logline: Post global annihilation, a recording device is sent back in time to uncover what happened. Upon arrival, the device is discovered by three estranged friends trying to reconnect on a camping trip. As the world falls apart around them, Caleb, Manny, and Lilah must come to terms with themselves and each other before the end.

5.

Song of the Open Road: The Story of the Southern California Youth Chorale
Dir. Melissa Dowler
USA
Logline: The story of the Southern California Youth Chorale, inspired by one extraordinary Music Teacher, who took on the difficult task of challenging talented but insulated teenagers of the sixties and seventies to become Musical Ambassadors while performing around the world, and how those experiences continue to affect their lives even today.

6.

PRELUDE
Dir. Tsubasa Matsumoto
USA
Logline: Alex shares distressing thoughts about life to a girl he is smitten with, Marion; his ideas reveal the greater truth of their birth.

7.

Memories For Sale
Dir. Manuel Lopez
Costa Rica
Logline: After his alcoholic father's death, a young man decides to sell the last memory of him - his taxi.

8.

Takeout
Dir. Tancredi Lo Cascio
UK
Logline: A seemingly content married couple are tending to household tasks within their luxurious apartment. The wife is tidying and cleaning the room, while the husband is preparing a delicious curry stew. However, the idyllic image is soon tainted by a growing sense of unease as it becomes clear that the two have committed a gruesome murder and are cooking up their victim(s).

9.

Irises
Dir. Jun Kuromiya
USA
Logline: Following their mother’s funeral, Izumi and Michiko return to their mother’s home to confront a life without parents. While Izumi was born in Japan, Michiko was born in America after their family immigrated; together, the two sisters occupy new roles as the only existing generation of their family. The chasmic differences in Japanese and American culture manifest in the quiet absence of their mother, and the two sisters must face their loss in the uncharted space between two lands.

10.

Drowning
Dir. James Honeycutt
Japan
Logline: Yumi, a Japanese student, struggles to cope with the loss of her friend and an inattentive mother while juggling her last year of high school and romance.

11.

Before the Typhoon Comes
Dir. Chen Yun
China
Logline: The father takes Chen to the beach, but unfortunately there’s a typhoon coming. Chen is determined to swim. In the choppy sea, Chen meets his himself in childhood and tries to have a reconciliation with him.

12.

The coming of spring
Dir. Ji Yang, Yixiao Jiang
China
Logline: When Doudou, a middle school student who has been living with her grandmother since childhood, experiences her first ever period, complex emotions began to stir. During this sensitive time, she gradually appreciates the rather conventional, oriental style of love and care from her grandmother, and the barriers between them start to melt away.

13.

Hypertension
Dir. Taito Kawata
Finland
Logline: Hypertension aka high blood pressure, rages like a forest fire through generations of a Senegalese family, causing a destructive underlying condition for a father and his son.