Kamata Prelude
A four-part film done in the unique style of each director, Matusbayashi Urara gives a portrayal of a strugglin...
Directing
Born in 1982 in Otawara, Tochigi prefecture, Watanabe Hirobumi graduated in Japanese literature and, after graduation, entered the Japan Academy of Moving Images. His graduation project, the 41-minute film The Light Pig of August (Hachigatsu no Karui Buta), received the Grand Prix at the Fuji Film Lovers Festival, as well as other awards. In 2013, together with his brother Yuji, composer of film music, he created Foolish Piggies Films in his hometown of Otawara. Their first production was also the debut in Watanabe's feature film, And the Mud Ship Sails Away..., which was presented at the 26th edition of the Tokyo International Film Festival and had several screenings outside Japan. The film was released in Japanese theatres in December 2014. His second film, 7 Days, won the best film award in the Japanese Cinema Splash section of the 28th Tokyo International Film Festival. He has been invited to several other festivals and won the Nippon Vision Jury Award at the 17th edition of the Nippon Connection festival. Subsequently, Watanabe shot at least one film a year, always with his brother Watanabe Yuji as the author of the soundtrack and Bang Woo-hyun as director of photography. However, for his most recent film, I'm Really Good (2020), Watanabe also served as a cameraman. This is also his first title in which his grandmother, who died last year at the age of 102, does not appear. After almost a decade of consistency, more or less with the same people in front of and behind the camera, Watanabe's career seems to have come to a turning point.
Browse movies and TV shows featuring Hirobumi Watanabe
A four-part film done in the unique style of each director, Matusbayashi Urara gives a portrayal of a strugglin...
Arakawa Ao lives happily on his own and hardly ever leaves Shimokitazawa, where he works at a vintage clothing...
One day, while Seiya was calling everybody on the phone to tell them "It's me, thank you" on the rooftop of a b...
Professional boxer Sota Kusunoki has gained popularity for his fighting style, where he goes headlong into his...
A bittersweet, hilarious, enlightening and inspirational road trip through Japanese arthouse cinemas with a hea...
Aoi is a 17-year-old girl uncertain about her future, but one thing she’s sure of is her pride in being a junio...
Born out of every artist’s creative crisis, the search for the next topic, Hirobumi WATANABE presents his lates...
The band "Techno Brothers" played by Watanabe, brother Watanabe Yuji and pal Kurosaki Takanori, go to find fame...
Kanako Seri is on a packed bus heading to band practice. She becomes fascinated by a melody being hummed by ano...
A normal day for little Riko at home and at school. A vivid snapshot pervaded by the calm flow of reality that...
What happens when Watanabe meets horror? The eccentric director of instant cult movie "Techno Brothers" plays a...
The latest unique human drama from Hirobumi and Yuji Watanabe portrays, in black and white and without words, a...
Poolsideman's Watanabe Brothers stamp their trademark brand of humor and melancholy on this gem of a road movie...
In a suburb north of Tokyo that seems to be secluded from the world’s madness and malice, Yusuke Mizuhara works...