Hitoshi Yazaki

Hitoshi Yazaki (b. 1956, Kajikazawa, Japan) founded a film club (for shooting short movies) with Shunichi Nagasaki while studying screenwriting at university. In 1979 he and Nagasaki (a pioneer on the independent 8mm scene) founded their own production company, and in 1980 Yazaki completed his feature debut Afternoon Breezes (Kazetachi no gogo), which in Japan became a sensation of non-studio filmmaking, and even made it into foreign distribution. He achieved similar success with March Comes in Like a Lion (Sangatsu no raion, 1991), his first commercial feature. In the new millennium he shot the four-hour drama The Girl Who Picks Flowers and the Girl Who Kills Insects (Hana wo tsumu shôjo to mushi wo korosu shôjo, 2000) and adapted the manga by Kiriko Nananan entitled Strawberry Shortcakes (Sutoroberî shotokeikusu, 2006). —Karlovy Vary IFF