A scene from "Dozens of Norths", a 2021 film by Koji Yamamura. (source: Miyu Production)
Two catastrophic events, a 2011 earthquake in Japan and a global coronavirus pandemic, led to Japanese animator Koji Yamamura making his first feature animated film, “Dozens of Norths”.
Anxiety about the future, which persecuted the animation director following the natural disaster, and a commission from the Bungakukai monthly literary magazine to create the series of 32 cover illustrations and short texts from 2012 to 2014, became the starting point for Yamamura to write a film script. The pandemic provided him with enough time to create and release the film.
Co-produced by the French company Miyu Productions, the film premiered last year.
“It’s my longest film thus far but the smallest number of people who worked on drawing it,” the independent animator told a crowd during the Biennial of Animation Bratislava.
Koji Yamamura is awarded the Prix Klingsor prize for his lifetime work focused on children during the Biennial of Animation Bratislava on October 7, 2022. (source: Facebook/Festival BAB)
Yamamura’s debut feature was among the screened films people could watch at this year’s animation festival, which ended on Sunday.
