Those Who Vanish - and Those Who Continue Searching for Them
Sneak Preview Screening: "Ghost of Ueno" followed by a Q&A with director Wang Qi
and actors Mugi Kadowaki and Naoto Takenaka
Tuesday, July 28 at 6:00 pm
In Japanese with English subtitles Japan/China/South Korea 2026 92 minutes
Directed by: Wang Qi
Written by: Li Yang, Wang Qi, Wayne Wang
Produced by: Soichiro Koga, Huang Yue
Starring: Mugi Kadowaki, Kazuki Muramatsu, Shingo Ipponki, Jin Hisa, Minoru Maehara,
Takahiro Hirano, Shiho Sasaki, Yuko Teru, Ai Hime, Naoyuki Fernandez, Shin'ichi Yang,
Riho Ikezaki, Fumiaki Harada and Naoto Takenaka
Film courtesy of Nakachika
Each year, some 80,000 people vanish in Japan, many of them never to be seen again, and 30,000 die alone. While the country's missing-person/lonely death crisis has drawn attention from overseas, Wang Qi's "Ghost of Ueno" is one of the first films to explore "disappearance" as a way of life. Developed and cowritten by acclaimed filmmaker Wayne Wang ("The Joy Luck Club," "Smoke"), it is a quiet mystery about the questions left behind, and about those who continue to search.
Set in and around Ueno Park - a cultural and zoological mecca for visitors from around the world, which once housed a substantial homeless community - "Ghost of Ueno" follows Satsuki (Kadowaki), a social worker who discovers a diary left in a blue-tarp shelter by a homeless man who has just died, known only as Gojo. Together with Toshi (Takenaka), an affable resident of the park who remembers him, Satsuki begins searching for clues to the man's identity.
Driven by a growing rapport between the two souls, each lost in their own way, what starts as an inquiry into a solitary death gradually unfolds into a meditation on disappearance, memory, family and the fragile bonds that persist between people. Against the backdrop of a Tokyo that is constantly being transformed, if only on the surface, the film finds warmth, humor and unexpected grace notes in its intimate portrait of people who exist at society's margins.
Please join us for this sneak preview and a discussion about the film's development, its distinctive collaborative production process, and its exploration of homelessness and belonging in contemporary Japan before the domestic release of "Ghost of Ueno" on August 8.
For more (in Japanese): https://ghostofueno.com/
Raised between China, Japan and the UK, director WANG QI is a filmmaker whose work often explores identity, memory and displacement across cultures. His short film "Caochang" (2012) was selected for the Generation Kplus Competition at the Berlin International Film Festival, while his debut feature "First Day of Chinese New Year" (2015) won the Golden Zenith Award for Best First Fiction Feature at the Montreal World Film Festival. His next feature, "The Bargain" (2021) received a Special Mention in the Kim Jiseok Award section at the Busan International Film Festival. "Ghost of Ueno" marks his first feature set in Japan.
MUGI KADOWAKI won the Best New Actress Award at the 88th Kinema Junpo Awards in 2014 for her performance in films including "Love's Whirlpool." She later received the Best Actress Award at the 61st Blue Ribbon Awards for her leading role in the 2018 film "Dare to Stop Us." Highlights of her filmography also include "Double Life" (2015), "Farewell Song" (2019), "Aristocrats" (2021), "Water Flowing Together" (2021), "The Tenmasou Inn" (2022), "Undercurrent" (2023), "Old Fox" (2024, in which she played a Taiwanese woman and spoke in Mandarin), "Blonde" (2025) and "White Flowers and Fruits" (2025). She has also continued to be very active on television, where she first got her start.
NAOTO TAKENAKA is one of Japan's most celebrated actors and filmmakers, with a career spanning more than four decades across film, television, and theater. He won Japan Academy Film Prize awards for his unforgettable supporting performances in "Sumo Do, Sumo Don't" (1992), "East Meets West" (1995) and "Shall We Dance?" (1996), and is widely known for portraying Toyotomi Hideyoshi in NHK's historical dramas. As a director, his debut feature "Nowhere Man" (1991) received the Fipresci Prize at the Venice International Film Festival, and he also earned acclaim for "Tokyo Days" (1997) and "Sayonara Color" (2005).
Please make your reservations at the FCCJ Reception Desk 03 3211-3161 or register online.
All film screenings are private, noncommercial events primarily for FCCJ members and their guests.
- Karen Severns, Film Committee