Cinema Jam: “Uncanny Terrain: The Documentary About the Devastation of Fukushima and Japanese Farming”

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Marija Makeska interviews filmmakers Junko Kajino and Ed M. Koziarski in Cinema Jam:

Junko: “Just like most of the Japanese people, I was always afraid of radiation from our history of atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The aftermath of the atomic bombs that we learned gave me nightmares for long time. The Fukushima Daiichi plant’s melt down gave me strong fear and lost hope in my own country till I found some farmer’s blogs. Some active framers were trying to decontaminate their contaminated land in Fukushima organically. I could not believe that they can do that and even they could keep farming without getting sick. But I wanted to believe that they can do this. Only way to find out is to go there and record how they do.”

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Work-in-Progress Screenings, Kartemquin Films, New Projects, and More

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IMG_6649
Mizuho Sugeno
asami girls cemetery
The Asami family farms in Aizu in Western Fukushima.

2013 greetings from Junko Kajino and Ed M. Koziarski of Homesick Blues Productions, the filmmakers behind the ongoing documentary Uncanny Terrain, about organic farmers in Fukushima, Japan fighting to hold onto their land and their livelihoods in the face of nuclear fallout.

We are well into editing footage from our first two years of production.

We are gearing up to return to Fukushima to capture the farmer’s ongoing struggle to build a healthier, more sustainable food supply, two years after the Great Japan Earthquake and Tsunami of 2011 and the meltdown of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.

Work-in-Progress Screenings

Work-in-progress footage from Uncanny Terrain will be screened in the Urgenci 5th International Community Supported Agriculture Conference, Tuesday, Jan. 22 at Asilomar Conference Grounds, Pacific Grove, California, and the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York’s 31st Annual Organic Farming and Gardening Conference, Friday, Jan. 25 at Saratoga Hilton & City Center, Saratoga Springs, New York. 

Please check out our work at these valuable conferences if you’re in the area.

Update from Fukushima

Organic farmer Seiji Sugeno is fighting to keep alive his mountain village of Towa, whose economy is ravaged by the aftermath of the nuclear disaster two years ago.  Sugeno is convinced that human contact is the key to overcoming public fears of Fukushima produce, so he travels Japan explaining Fukushima farmers’ efforts to reduce radioactive contamination and sustain the land their ancestors have cultivated for generations.

Sugeno’s 24-year-old daughter Mizuho has launched the Seed of Hope Company to welcome guests from across Japan and internationally to visit their idyllic Playing-with-Clouds Farm and experience the life their family is fighting to protect.

Masami Yoshizawa, who kept his 300 cows alive inside the nuclear evacuation zone in defiance of a government kill order, despite losing many cows to an outbreak of disease, has seen his herd grow to 350 with new births and the adoption of strays from neighboring farms.  Possibly in retaliation for his outspoken activism and media presence, Yoshizawa lost his permit to enter the evacuation zone.  The day before Yoshizawa and his team were set to give up and release the herd, he reversed course and set out to confront the officials who had denied his permit, and demand the right to continue caring for his cows.

As new disasters turn the eyes of the world and Japan away from Fukushima, Uncanny Terrain continues our journey with Yoshizawa and the Sugenos and the other farmers who struggle every day to find a way to live in tune with a natural environment compromised by manmade catastrophe.

 Kartemquin Films’ Diverse Voices in Docs

Uncanny Terrain codirector Junko Kajino has been invited to join Diverse Voices in Docs, a new program of pioneering Chicago documentary producers Kartemquin Films (Hoop Dreams, The Interrupters) and the Community Film Workshop of Chicago, designed to develop talent among Chicago’s minority nonfiction filmmakers.  Diverse Voices in Docs is supported by the Joyce Foundation, The Academy for Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, and Kat Lei Productions.

New Projects

We have launched two new documentary projects.  One project follows two very different high school rap groups in Chicago’s West Side Austin neighborhood.

The other project explores one Chicagoan’s efforts to replace Syria’s embattled Assad regime with a fledgling democracy.

Donations Ongoing

Thank you to everyone whose contributions have allowed us to get this far.  We continue to accept tax-deductible donations toward the ongoing production, post-production, and eventual release of Uncanny Terrain.  Here’s how.  We remain, as ever, deeply grateful for your support.

Thanks to Our Translators

We send our profound gratitude to our international team of volunteer translators, who have been invaluable to our editing process by producing English-language transcripts from hundreds of hours of Japanese-language footage.

Thank you to Meg Kajino, Eugene Kobayashi, Peter Arbaugh, Yo Shin, Noriko Hopkins, Kazari Getz Kikuchi, Hiroshi Yasuda, Alice Tallents, Ayaka Maekawa, Chris Watts, Hiroko Uenushi, Mari Kawade, Naoki Izumo, Priscilla Watson, Tomoko Nakano, and especially Miki Takada, who has translated 16 days worth of footage!

If you’re still working on a file, or I’ve left your name off this list, please let me know.  There are still many files left to translate, so if you can help, or you know someone who can, please drop us a line or spread the word.

 Our Previous Film

Our international psychological drama The First Breath of Tengan Rei is available via download, streaming, or DVD.  Find it here.

Uncanny Terrain is supported in part by grants from the Illinois Arts Council and the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs.

 

Press

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IMG_4342Un terreno inesperado
by Ed M. Koziarski
Dar Lugar
June 1, 2014

boyThe Documentary About the Devastation of Fukushima and Japanese Farming
Marija Makeska
Cinema Jam
Feb. 19, 2014

Still Praying for Tohoku: Uncanny Terrain follows mayoral candidacy of organic farmer in Fukushima
Ten Thousand Things from Kyoto
Jan. 21, 2014

World ViewUncanny Terrain: documentary focuses on Fukushima Farmers
Chicago Public Radio’s World View
Dec. 27, 2013

 

Still “Praying for Japan”
Uncanny Terrain explores impact of 3/11 on Fukushima family farmers, animals, soil, & nuclear evacuees
Ten Thousand Things
7/23/2013

 

 

 

YasukawaInterview with Uncanny Terrain codirector Ed M. Koziarski
by Nancy O’Mallon
About Harvest
6/20/2012

 

SugenoFukushima Organic Farmers Fight Odds to Continue Livelihood Amidst Radiation’s Unknowns
by Kimberly Hughes
Ten Thousand Things 
6/12/2012

Rice HarvestOther Stuff: Uncanny Terrain
By Sam Worley
Chicago Reader 
2/3/2012

 

Soma floating lantern ceremonyEating Fukushima
By Ed M. Koziarski
North Avenue Magazine
1/28/2012

cows2A pair of Chicago indie filmmakers captures farmers in the aftermath of Japan’s nuclear disaster
By Jake Malooley
TimeOut Chicago
1/25/2012

Fukushima farmers keep calm and carry on [VIDEO]
Ed M. Koziarski
Grist Magazine
9/20/2011

 

 

Crisis Abroad
Mike McNamara
Screen Magazine
8/31/2011

 

A Tale of Two FarmersA Tale of Two Farmers
Ruthie Iida
Notes From Hadano
7/28/2011

 

Directors to produce Japan documentary this spring
Ed M. Koziarski
Reel Chicago 04/29/2011

 

Documenting the Disaster: Words with director Junko Kajino before she heads to the devastated regions of Northeastern Japan to document the effects of radiation on local organic farmers
Quin Slovek
Inflatable Ferret
04/23/2011

 

Following the Farmers of Northern Japan, After the Quake
Twilight Greenaway
Civil Eats
04/21/2011

Filmmakers

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Director/producers Junko Kajino and Ed M. Koziarski were developing a narrative film based on Junko’s childhood on a cattle ranch in Nagano, central Japan, when the March 2011 earthquake, tsunami and meltdown struck. We quickly shifted our focus to a nonfiction project addressing the nuclear disaster. We kept our attention on Japanese farmers, finding inspiration in Fukushima organic farmers’ commitment to revive and continue cultivating land that others declared hopelessly contaminated.

We wrote, produced and directed the psychological drama feature film The First Breath of Tengan Rei. Erika Oda of Kore-Eda’s After Life stars as an Okinawan woman who kidnaps the teenage son of a U.S. Marine convicted of raping her when she was a girl. An IFP Independent Film Lab selection, First Breath screened theatrically, and at schools, community groups and festivals across the U.S., Japan and in India.

Our short film Homesick Blues, starring pop singer Zoey (now Remah) as an Osaka girl running off to America to sing the blues, won the IFP/Chicago Film Festival and played the Hawaii and Chicago international film festivals, among others.

Koziarski was line producer and Kajino was production manager of Malik Bader’s fake crime documentary Street Thief, a Tribeca Film Festival selection released by A&E Indie, where they analyze the circumstances about criminality and legal defense people receive in these cases, learn more at these news online about this. Koziarski was 1st assistant director of Wendy Jo Carlton’s lesbian romantic drama Hannah Free starring Sharon Gless, closing night film of the Frameline Film Festival, distributed by Wolfe Releasing.