Film Show 055: Takashi Ito
An interview with the Japanese experimental filmmaker about growing up in post-war Japan, Toshio Matsumoto, and his new film 'Distant Voices' (2024), which Tone Glow will present around the US
Takashi Ito
Takashi Ito (b. 1956) is a Japanese experimental filmmaker born in Fukuoka. As a child, he was interested in being a manga artist but decided to quit his endeavors after reading Osamu Tezuka’s Phoenix, feeling that he’d never be able to accomplish anything of such high caliber. He studied art at the Kyushu Institute of Design and, after watching films by the pioneering filmmaker Toshio Matsumoto, decided to take up filmmaking. After creating a few 8mm films, his senior thesis work—the beloved avant-garde masterpiece Spacy (1981)—was made under the guidance of Matsumoto himself. Ito would continue to make numerous short films in the decades that followed, eventually shooting footage of his family in the 1990s, starting with Venus (1990). More recently, he’s started making feature-length films, with his newest being the beguiling Distant Voices (2024).
Joshua Minsoo Kim spoke with Ito on July 19th, 2025 at the experimental film festival Invisible Spectrum: Media Imagination in Experimental Cinema, hosted in Beijing by the Outtakes Screening Group. The two discussed his relationship with his family, how his films are akin to shooting the audience with a gun, and the ideas that permeate his entire body of work. Special thanks to Yunming Zhang for live interpretation during the interview.
Tone Glow is also excited to present the North American premiere of Takashi Ito’s Distant Voices in Los Angeles this weekend at WHAMMY. His film will also be screened in more cities around the United States. The film follows two girls engaging in some magical form of communication—both with and through each other—across various liminal spaces. “A field of wilted sunflowers, a group of public housing units turned into ruins. Two girls who are like alter egos of each other. They wander around with a camera, one pointing it at mysterious things and at herself, the other hanging a black dress in various places and taking pictures of it.”
Tour Dates
Los Angeles: November 7th at WHAMMY (Ticket Link)
Milwaukee: November 14th & 15th at Union Cinema (Tickets in person only)
Philadelphia: November 15th at Asian Arts Initiative (Ticket Link) [This event is co-presented with Collaborative Cataloging Japan]
Chicago, Seattle, and New York dates to be announced
Joshua Minsoo Kim: I know you were born in Fukuoka. When you think about growing up there, what comes to mind?
Takashi Ito: I was born in 1956 and the war ended in 1945. Fukuoka underwent a lot of airstrikes, so it ended up as a place in total ruin. Through ten years of effort, Japan was able to build a lot of new buildings in the area and, as I was growing up, I was watching this city—half in ruins, half newly developed. I remember playing in these ruins with my friends, amidst these fallen bricks. There was this collapsed castle, too. Up until 6th grade, when I was 12, I was drawing a manga about monsters coming to town. They came to destroy things, and it was based on the street where I was born. We watched Distant Voices (2024) yesterday, and both that film and the one that screened before it, Zone (1995), were shot on location. I chose these dilapidated spaces for the films because, deep in my mind, I wanted to experience the scenery of my childhood.
I know that your father was a newspaper reporter and that your mother was a nurse. Do you mind talking about your parents? Did they have a significant impact on your life, or were they busy and not in your life much?
Because my parents were both working, I have more memories of spending time with my grandfather.
What was he like?
He was quite successful as an owner of a cafeteria. He had a big building in the middle of Fukuoka on this street called Tenjin [Editor’s Note: Tenjin is the biggest shopping street in Japan]. He owned the building and had a lot of staff—maybe over 100. All of this success, however, was before the war. During the war, it was lost in an airstrike—it was reduced to nothing. And after the war, he got conned; the land was taken away from him and he was left with nothing, so my family wasn’t rich when I was growing up. I lived with him, which is why I saw him a lot. When I would come home from elementary school, I would see him watching television, watching sumo wrestling. He’d be marking the charts for these matches, whether they won or lost, and that was his main interest.
Did you like sumo wrestling?
Not really (laughter). I remember that when my grandfather watched his favorite sumo wrestlers win, he’d celebrate in dramatic, grandiose fashion (mimics his loud, boisterous cheering). Most of my memories with my grandfather are of being indoors; I don’t remember him taking me outside.
Since my parents were always working, I didn’t get to see them a lot, and I felt there was a strong distance between us. We didn’t have a strong relationship, and I didn’t feel a strong parental love. I’ve never really thought about this until now, but when my first child was born, I shot footage of my baby. I made a few films with him, and as I started making those films, I was interested in depicting the distance between a parent and his child. This was probably a reflection of my experiences with my own parents. These are very good questions… you’ve made me realize that throughout my whole career, I’ve perhaps been focusing on this distance between people. In Distant Voices, you can tell that these two girls can’t get within reach of one another. There’s always this theme of distance.
Who was the first person in your life you felt close to? Was it your grandfather?
I have really fond memories of this boy from kindergarten. I still remember how we played together, and it felt like real friendship. We were close through elementary school and would visit each other, but we lost touch in middle school. We’re no longer in contact, but I still have these memories of going to his place and playing with him. I don’t even know if that friend is still alive, but what remains is this knowledge that he was a good friend. This idea of having someone who was close to you who is now no longer accessible… it perhaps instigated my filmmaking and the unbridgeable distance between my characters
You talked about drawing manga. I know you were inspired by Osamu Tezuka, and I read that you felt that he was so good that you decided to give up on pursuing manga. Is there a reason why you didn’t feel the same with filmmaking?
As a kid, I always wanted to be a manga artist. I was reading a lot of Tezuka’s work, including Mighty Atom [aka Astro Boy]. In elementary school, I was drawing my own manga, but in middle school Tezuka released his series Phoenix and I was in shock. I was astonished by the broadness and philosophical depth of how he depicted human beings—it was about the evolution of human society. He was able to depict this world in such a tremendous way that I never felt I could catch up with him. I was in despair, and so I gave up on being a manga artist. With film, I felt like there was still hope, there was still possibility. And I eventually discovered experimental films, which really explored the possibilities of the medium.
In the 1970s there were numerous Japanese experimental filmmakers. There was Toshio Matsumoto, of course, and Nobuhiro Aihara, Isao Kota, and Shunzo Seo. Where did you first see Japanese experimental films and what impact did they have on you?
My first contact with experimental film was during my freshman year in college at the Kyushu Institute of Design. There was a screening of Toshio Matsumoto’s films and I went there with the expectation that I’d be watching something very different. I had no idea what experimental films were, and instead of the despair I felt with manga, I felt excitement, like I was being called to make experimental films myself. At this time, I was already a big fan of films and would go to the movie theater. These were big productions, though, and more so about entertainment. They cost a lot of money to make, so seeing Matsumoto’s films made me realize, even with a single camera, you can make inspiring images, images that convey a lot of meaning, that meant a lot to people. It didn’t feel like the door was closed to me because I didn’t have a lot of money. I was so shocked by the screening that I wasn’t able to leave my seat when it ended. I was really inspired by his films’ vision and methodologies.
You mentioned that you watched these bigger films, and I also know that your dad was a cinephile. Did any of these films inspire you as well, or was it just these smaller experimental films?
One director I want to highlight is Steven Spielberg. I like him for his storytelling devices, how they always draw the audience into the film. His dramaturgy was something I always wanted to absorb and appear in my own works. Even with Spacy (1981), I had this idea of introducing a narrative structure into the film to make it more alluring. There was also Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver (1976). I watched it when I started making experimental films, and what really struck me was that towards the end of the film, Travis kills people but is still treated as a hero. There’s this ambivalence, and you see how good and evil can co-exist in someone. I’d never seen that before, and this ambivalence is what remains an inspiration for my own filmmaking.
I was always interested in boundaries. What’s the boundary between life and death, between good and evil? Is there a clear line? Perhaps there isn’t one, and that things are beyond good and evil. There was also, traditionally, a line drawn between reality and fiction or maybe reality and dreams. I wanted these things to be blended, to melt into one another. That’s how I approach my films. As I was maturing, this idea of blurred lines became more concrete within my art, though it initially started with Taxi Driver and Matsumoto’s Funeral Parade of Roses (1969).
I wanted to show you Nobuhiro Aihara’s Stone (1975) on my phone (shows video). Do you remember when you first saw this film?
I watched it around the time I watched Matusmoto’s films. It was a big inspiration for me because Aihara was using a lot of animation, though it was a different methodology from what was typical. You could even say that Aihara defied conventions regarding the animation that came before him. That inspired me to approach animation in my own way. Around when I was 20, I watched a lot of films that defied common sense. It was the trend of the day, really, and I watched a lot in a short period, and that was what sparked my career as an experimental filmmaker. As I was watching a lot of films that defied stereotypes, I felt that I should do the same.
I know that you studied ceramics and sculpture when you were in college. Were there people who inspired you from these fields too?
I didn’t major in that, I just took a course. I majored in… it wasn’t studio art, it was more like a craftsman’s art. That’s why I was able to study a lot of techniques in different fields, including graphic design, painting, sculpture, and photography. We had to take photos, develop them, and print them—it was good to learn that.
In the ’60s and ’70s there were a lot of folks involved in avant-garde theater productions, and these involved a wide array of artists and mediums. I’m thinking of the stuff that Shuji Terayama, for example, was involved with. I’m also thinking about how, for example, Takehisa Kosugi made both music and films, and how the Taj Mahal Travellers would have films play behind them as they performed. Did you experience a lot of these multimedia events?
I was always in Fukouka, and a lot of the multimedia events that you’re talking about happened in Tokyo. As a result, I didn’t get to watch a lot of them. But there was this author, Kobo Abe, who had this experimental play. There was this huge white linen cloth laid on the stage. The performers climbed under it, stood up, and acted. And during the performance, there were projections and other things as well. That was a really good experience for me. The core concept of Kobo Abe’s experimental theater was also to defy common sense, to defy stereotypes. I also watched this around when I was 20. [Editor’s Note: Ito is talking about Abe’s The Little Elephant is Dead.]
Before you made Spacy, you made films on 8mm. These were Timespace (1977), Noh (1977), and the Movement trilogy (1978-1980). You’ve said that you were essentially copying Matsumoto with these works and that Spacy was the first time you made something that was distinctly your own. What made Spacy stand out in that way?
I was very conscious that I was copying Matsumoto. I was so inspired by Atman (1975) that I just wanted to make something just like Matsumoto for those first two films. As I was repeatedly imitating him, I realized that I wanted to make my own works. Movement 3 (1980) was when things started to change, and that was essentially a test run for Spacy. As I was making Spacy in 1980 and 1981, Matsumoto actually came to teach at Kyushu University, and Matsumoto was actually a film instructor.
How was he as an instructor? What kind of guy was he?
Before Matsumoto came to Kyushu to teach, I only knew him through his works and I thought, oh, he must be a magnificent person. I was a bit of a troublemaker, though. When Matsumoto came to our school, he heard rumors about how I was a troublemaker, and during our first meeting, he had a very serious and cautious face. He asked me to bring him all my previous films, so I did. These were the 8mm works. Matusmoto saw them and eventually became the [advisor] of my senior thesis, which was Spacy. When Matsumoto saw my ideas, he screamed very loudly, “This is going to be great!” And he also asked, “Can you actually do this? Can the camera go into the image, and keep going into it?!” It was through this film that we started working together.
How were you a troublemaker?
I had already done four years of college before Matsumoto came. I got a job after graduation and passed the exams and I said yes to an offer for this company, but after I learned that Matsumoto was going to teach at Kyushu University, I reneged and just went back to school. Both the school and the company got mad at me.
A lot of the soundtracks for your films are also experimental, be they ambient or musique concrète. Did you talk a lot with Takashi Inagaki about what the soundtracks should sound like?
Me and Inagaki were in the same year in college, though we were in different departments. He liked minimalist music, and when I started to make films, I just asked him to make the soundtracks. I would let him do whatever he wanted—I wouldn’t give too many instructions. He was interested in classical music, but he was also interested in composers like Terry Riley. If you listen to the soundtrack for Thunder (1982), it sounds like a woman speaking, but she’s just saying nonsense. She’s saying things like, “I’m a pepper, I’m a cabbage.” Inagaki thought that we should defy conventions of music, of this notion that music had to have any sort of meaning; we wanted meaninglessness to be the basis for the music. It was interesting because I would just do the visuals and he would make the soundtracks, and when we were done, I’d get to see the film in a new way. The films became richer.
Did Inagaki already have music that he’d add to your films, or did he make them after he saw your works?
We’d have meetings where I’d tell him I was making a movie, and I’d explain what it’s about. I’d go make the film, edit it, and it’d be picture locked before handing it to Inagaki. For example, before I made Spacy, we had a meeting and I told him what I was going to do. Inagaki said, “Based on what you’re saying, we should have the music have these scales that move infinitely up and down.” (mimics soundtrack). There are these repetitions.
I wanted to ask, given Spacy’s setting—did you play basketball?
Yes. I was on the basketball team in middle school—I wasn’t on the bench, either. After that, I had an accident and the doctor told me that I shouldn’t play anymore. In college I thought, maybe I can play again, but it still wasn’t feasible. Historically, there is this term called “the second generation of the atomic bomb.” When the US dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, my father was working and exposed to the radiation. I was a weak child growing up, and I sometimes wonder if that’s the reason why.
There are films like Thunder and Grim (1985) where we’re in domestic spaces. Was this a specific goal for you, to take these familiar locations and make them unsettling?
There was always this idea of transforming the everyday. That’s why I always pick something that everybody knows: a gymnasium, a family home, a street next to where people actually lived. I wanted to depict these spaces as alienating, as something that is no longer everyday. I’m trying to find the manga I drew as a child (looks through phone). I had a solo exhibition recently and they presented the manga I made in elementary school. The title is Fight, and this is the monster manga I mentioned earlier—there were three volumes (shows photos on his phone). Even in this manga, it was about the city where I lived. A monster invades it and the things you see every day become transformed.
What was the reception like to your films from the early ’80s?
The first films, including Spacy and Thunder, had a good reputation, especially overseas. I sold a lot of copies to international institutions and there’s works in the Centre Pompidou’s collection, for example.
You worked on films made by other directors, such as Gakuryu Ishii’s The Crazy Family (1984). You also worked on Toshiharu Ikeda’s Evil Dead Trap (1988) and films by Kaizo Hayashi. I wanted to show you the final aerial scene from The Crazy Family, as you can clearly tell you made it (shows clip on phone). What was it like working on these films?
I didn’t really gain any insight from those experiences. They were just jobs.
You talked about filming your son earlier. You have films like December Hide-and-Go-Seek (1993), The Moon (1994), and Zone (1995). Was it hard for you to make films that now involved people in more deliberate ways? The ’90s definitely feel like a new era in your career.
With regards to shooting footage of my own family, including my wife and son, I wasn’t really thinking, “I’m the father and you’re my son, I’m the husband and you’re my wife, and we have these relationships.” It’s not so simple. This goes back to my previous conversation about distance. It’s more like, “I’m the husband, and I’m going to look at my wife from a distance. I’m a father, but I’m going to look at my son from a distance.” This started with Venus (1990). With December Hide-and-Go-Seek, I was very conscious about maintaining a sort of distance. There was this unsettling, unpleasant feeling as a result of it.
Did you try to be close to your own family as a result of the distance you felt between yourself and your own parents?
Even though I said that my parents were always working, it’s not that we didn’t have a loving bond. It was just a fact: they were always busy. In daily life, he was a loving father. Filmmaking is different, though. Filmmaking is a series of “what ifs.” What if we have this distance between us?
Do you feel like you’ve learned anything about yourself given that you’ve made films that pose such questions?
I made these films because I wanted to understand myself more. I believe that everybody has these internal questions that they want to explore and filmmaking is just a way to do that. When December Hide-and-Go-Seek first screened in front of an audience, they said it was a cruel film. “You’re treating your child as a thing—he’s a person!” And I said, “Yup, you got it.” (laughter). That’s exactly what I wanted. I wanted to explore how cruelty could be translated onscreen. This was another “what if.”
You’ve started making feature films lately. You had Toward Zero (2021) and yesterday we saw Distant Voices. What compelled you to make these longer works?
My earlier short films, like Spacy, were “one-shot” films. By that I mean, it was as if I had one bullet in my chamber and I was shooting the audience with a gun. For longer films, you can enjoy the process a little more, as there’s no longer just one bullet in the chamber. You can stab a person, give them a little jab, and then keep punching them so that they’re in a lot of pain but not quite dead. And then you can take out your gun and finish the job. A longer film is like this.
What was it like to make Distant Voices? You have techniques that even harken back to Spacy.
Distant Voices certainly has this interest in merging animation and on-location shooting. As you saw, the beginning of the film starts with these pictures, and these were actually works by the girl who later appears in the film. It’s almost by necessity that you then have that sequence.
How do you find the actors and actresses for your films?
They’re mostly people close to me. And when I was teaching at university, I’d ask students from my seminar or other instructors in the department to appear in the film. I don’t have a specific “type” that I need for a film. In Toward Zero, I did need a specific actor—I needed someone who could dance. I went to Nobuo Harada, and he has been studying Butoh for a long while—I needed that sort of physicality. That was an exception to the rule. Otherwise, no actor is different from anybody else. I don’t want to bring on people in my films who know how to act. I want people who don’t know. Most of the characters who appear in my works should appear as though they have a Noh mask on them, where there is no expression. Through this lack of expression, the audience is able to detect what they are expecting to feel.
What are you working on right now? What’s next for you?
It’s a work in progress—a thought in progress. I don’t know exactly what it’s going to be. I want something innovative, and I’m thinking very hard about that “how to kill the audience” problem with the new film.
There are a few quick questions I wanted to ask you. Were you familiar with experimental films made outside of Japan when you started making experimental films?
Yes, of course. Norman McLaren, Jan Švankmajer, and the Brothers Quay. I had the most shock from the latter, especially Street of Crocodiles (1986).
Are you inspired by any contemporary filmmakers?
Not really. I’ll watch the new Steven Spielberg film when it comes out though.
Do you feel like your films are distinctly Japanese in any way?
No.
Were you ever inspired by pink films or Roman Porno films?
I watched them but didn’t find them very interesting.
Is there anything you wanted to talk about today that we didn’t get to?
No, but it’s been a good conversation. It really inspired me to think about my own career and films. You have great vitality. My face and others’ faces at this festival look so tired, but you’re always so energetic.
Thank you. There’s a question I end all my interviews with and I wanted to ask it to you. Do you mind sharing one thing you love about yourself?
It’s hard to answer it directly. There are things in me that I dislike, but I can take them and turn them into images. The fact that I can do this—that I can make images based on the parts of myself that I dislike—makes me feel good.
What are the parts of yourself you dislike?
I dislike that I want to remain distant from people.
Thank you for reading the 55th issue of Film Show. One-shotted.
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