Leeds International Film Festival has announced the programme for its 36th edition, to be held 3–17 November 2022 at venues in Leeds, with most shorts and some features also available to rent from throughout the UK on Leeds Film Player.
The programme, as announced so far, includes two entirely animated Japanese movies:
- The northern premiere of Goodbye, Don Glees! (Gubbai, Don Gurīzu!, 2021), in Japanese with English subtitles on 6 November at 15:45 at the Cottage Road Cinema, plus two additional screenings at Vue Leeds The Light. The movie will screen across the UK and Ireland, distributed by Anime Limited, from 30 November, according to the current edition of the Showcase Presents brochure available at Showcase Cinemas (scan of the relevant page below).
- The theatrical version of Sumito Sakakibara's Iizuna Fair (Iizuna Ennichi, 2021), in World Animation Short Film Competition Programme 1 on 11 November at 17:45 at the Howard Assembly Room (also available online). A trailer for the wordless short, originally created as an installation for Nagano Art Museum, is on Sakakibara's Vimeo account. It won Best Non-Narrative Short at Ottawa International Animation Festival this September.
The programme also includes two primarily live-action movies related to anime:
- The UK premiere of ANIME SUPREMACY! (Haken anime!, 2022), on 6 November at 13:00 at the Cottage Road Cinema, plus one additional screening at Vue Leeds The Light (online availability to be confirmed). The live-action movie, which stars Riho Yoshioka (Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko) and Tomoya Nakamura (Oh, Suddenly Egyptian God) with Tasuku Emoto (INU-OH) and Machiko Ono (Modest Heroes), is based on the novel written by Mizuki Tsujimura (A School Frozen in Time, True Mothers) and originally illustrated by CLAMP (though the English edition sadly replaced their illustrations). The movie was directed by Kohei Yoshino (who worked on the CG and design of your name.) and written for the screen by Yōsuke Masaike. The two anime within the movie were produced by Production I.G: one directed by Azuma Tani (Thermae Romae, Animation × Paralympic) with original character design by Eisaku Kubonouchi (Animation × Paralympic, Carole & Tuesday) and mechanical design by Takayuki Yanase (Ghost in the Shell: Arise, DEATH STRANDING), the other directed by Takashi Ōtsuka (Pretty Cure, ONE PIECE) with original character design by Takahiro Kishida (Durarara!!, Madoka Magica, Haikyu!!). Both CLAMP and Kubonouchi also illustrated alternative posters for the movie's Japanese release. A trailer with English subtitles is on Fantasia International Film Festival's Vimeo account.
- The Yorkshire premiere of The Voice Actress (2022), starring real-life voice and stage actress Urara Takano (Sakura Wars, Ah! My Goddess) with appearances by voice artists Ariyo, Ayane Hayakawa, Nonoka Mamiya, Rui Egawa, Taichi Shimizu, Taishi Hamamoto, Takuya Umeda and Yuto Ohashi, and written and directed by Anna J. Takayama (Takano's daughter and a former teenage talent and voiceover artist herself, under the name Anna Kirie), in Louis Le Prince International Short Film Competition – Programme 2: Smoke on the Water on 11 November at 20:30 at Everyman Leeds (also available online). A concept teaser with English subtitles is on Takayama's Vimeo account and there is more information about the short, which is a co-production between Japan and the United States, on its official website. It won the Mailchimp Support the Shorts Award at SXSW Film Festival in March, and both the Japan Competition Audience Award at Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia and a special mention at Palm Springs International ShortFest in June.
The festival will also be playing several other Japanese movies, including the UK premiere of SADAKO DX (2022), the latest entry in the Japanese Ring series of movies, originally based on books by Koji Suzuki that have also been adapted into manga and video games (coincidentally, the first theatrical Ring movie will be playing in its 4K restoration at some Showcase Cinemas in the UK on 25 October), the Spanish–French animated feature Unicorn Wars (2022, licensed, like the writer and director's previous feature, Birdboy, for Northern America by frequent anime distributor GKIDS), and various other animated shorts in the Leeds Short Film Awards section.
Individual tickets to in-person screenings are £9.50/£7.50 for features and £8.00/£6.00 for programs of shorts. The LIFF LITE PASS, giving six tickets for the price of five, is available for £47.50/£37.50. The LIFF BUZZ PASS gives people 25 years old and younger six tickets and is available for £30. The LIFF EXPLORER PASS, the best value for one person attending 9–29 screenings, costs £60 (six tickets are included and additional ones are £5 each), while the LIFF EXPLORER GOLD PASS, the best value for one person attending 30+ screenings, is £180 and includes access to all screenings in venues and all features and shorts available online.
The festival will have a free launch event playing a program of trailers on a cinema screen, with the printed guide available to pick up, on 12 October at Vue Leeds The Light, with one screening at 18:00 and a second at 19:30. Though free to attend, places for the screenings are limited and need to be booked in advance.
