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7 cities, 8 venues

The festival toured in 7 cities across Japan--Tokyo, Fukuoka, Nagoya, Sapporo, Kawagoe, Osaka, and Hakodate. Screenings were also again held in Los Angeles and Myanmar.

Submissions: Over 1,400 films from 57 countries

From this enormous number of submitted works, the committee selected 68 shorts from 22 countries.

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General Programs

International Competition (6 programs, 49 films)

Special Themes
- Documentary Short Shorts
Lately documentary films seem to be on the rise, earning both critical success and popular following. This year, a number of outstanding documentary shorts were submitted, and we selected some of the world's best to screen.
- Children Short Shorts
While terrible news of terrorism and war have dominated the world today, Short Shorts witnessed that many of our submissions featured children, and these selected shorts dealt with both the happiness and the pain of childhood.
- Non-Dialogue Short Shorts (Non-competition)
Music, movement, visual composition . . . there are many forms of expression on film that do not require dialogue. Non-dialogue story-telling is particularly effective in the world of short film.

National Competition Section (3 program, 13 films)

Over the past 5 years, the Short Shorts Film Festival has introduced international short films to Japan and Japanese short films to the world. The number and quality of the Japanese submissions continued to progress rapidly. In its 6th year, to highlight the Japanese selections, Short Shorts has created 3 programs that comprised exclusively of Japanese productions. The audience saw the bright talents of Japan, through the official 13 films and 4 special screening shorts.

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Deluxe Special Programs:

Maestro Short ShortsIn its first year, the Short Shorts Film Festival screened George Lucas's short films, and in successive years, the festival has always welcomed the early works of famous directors. In 2003, the festival committee was proud to present "Lick The Star", by Sofia Coppola, winner of the 2003 Academy Award® for Best Screenplay.

Greek Short Shorts

The Short Shorts Film Festival 2004 celebrated the Olympics' return to Athens, Greece. From the classic to modern, we presented Greek shorts, with appreciation to the Greek Film Center.

All Night Screenings at Virgin Cinemas Roppongi Hills

Prior to the official kick-off on June 5th, special all night screenings were held at the Virgin Cinemas Roppongi Hills from June 3rd to 5th. 9 programs from the Short Shorts Film Festival 2004 were screened.

Closing Ceremony:

The closing ceremony was held on the last day. Each clip of the winners was screened. All the Jury members, festival staff, and visiting filmmakers gathered at the venue, Laforet Museum Harajuku.

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Jury

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Awards

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New Experience: Short Shorts Film Festival Asia 2004

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Over 400 films from 16 countries / regions

Though it was our first Short Shorts Film Festival Asia, 51 films, selected from over 400 works from 16 Asian countries/regions, were considered for competition.

SSFFA 2004 Program Highlights

From high quality Korean productions to celebrity-studded Hong Kong vignettes, from rarely seen gems from Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Vietnam, the sheer range of countries and regions and diversity of styles and genres in our programs demonstrated the strength of Asian cinema.

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Highlights

Asian Short Shorts

A new cinema that is young, hip, and multimedia savvy. Our spine-chilling Ghost shorts may give you a cold sweat, but our Asian selection turns on the heat with the tropical melodies of Southeast Asia and the Indian Subcontinent. As well, Chinese filmmakers display diverse perspectives.

National Short Shorts

Short films are a thriving genre in Japan, with new blood continuously injected into an ever-growing pool of talent. The SSFFA selection offers a taste with films you may not see in other Japanese festivals!

Ghost Short Shorts

Horror is a major genre in new Korean cinema that stands out for its stylish art direction, dark, unsettling vision, and graphic, no-holds-barred violence. From scores of excellent entries, we have chosen six that reflect a stunning spectrum of styles. From Thailand, Malaysia, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Japan, come supernatural tales that run the gamut from palpable, grotesque horror, to creepy suspense, from black humor to heartwarming drama.

Invitation Short Shorts

(5 films: One in each Program A to E)

Like the Maestro section of SSFF, Short Shorts Film Festival Asia offers a non-competition Special Program of works by world acclaimed directors, superstars and outstanding new talents. This year, we are proud to introduce an early vignette by Cannes Palm d'Or winner (Short) Raymond Red (A Study for "The Skies"), a star-studded musical directed by Asian pop-king Andy Lau and produced by HK auteur Johnnie To ("Love Under the Sun"), a campy 70's ghost short starring Chow Yun Fat ("Reappearance"), a riveting war story which won 25 international awards, by Ham Tran, a Vietnamese director who has become a young hero in US indie film circles ("The Anniversary"), and an ass-kicking action comedy by new Philippine talent Topel Lee ("Bruce").

Special Program

"The Bike Boy" & "ZOO"
Our very first Short Shorts Film Festival Asia includes the Japan premiere of "The Bike Boy" (Audience Award, Busan Asian Short Film Festival 2003), directed by Yoo Ji-Tae, Korea's prominent actor who starred in Park Chan-Wook's "Old Boy"(Grand Prix, Cannes 2004) and "ZOO", (the title-project piece of assorted original horror short films) written by the most popular mystery/horror writer Otsuichi. Starring Jun Murakami.

Closing Ceremony

The Closing Ceremony was held at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography. After all five members of the Jury took turns to announce the winning Asian films and the Japanese films that received 'Encouragement' mentions, clips of selective winners were screened.

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Jury

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Awards