The Niigata Animation Film Festival (NIAFF), set to be the largest animation film festival in Asia, will be held in Niigata City in March 2023. Transmitting animation culture from Niigata to the world!

The Niigata Animation Film Festival will be an annual event focusing on full-length animated commercial films from Japan and across the world. It is the first festival to feature famous full-length animated works like those by Studios Ghibli.
Also, NIAFF will serve as a platform to present research papers on animation/comics to develop Japanese animation into a global content.

Simultaneous press conference announcing launch of NIAFF on 23 May at Cannes, Tokyo & Niigata

The director of Ghost in The Shell, Mamoru Oshii, will be the jury president; journalist Tadashi Sudo as artistic director; KADOKAWA’s senior advisor Shinichiro Inoue as festival director.
Planning and production is by the head of EUROSPACE Kenzo Horikoshi, and head of the production company GENCO Taro Maki, which has worked on films such as ‘In a Corner of the World’ and ‘Mobile Police PatLABOR’.

NIAFF aims to be a place where cultural values can be shared, works can be appreciated and human resources and studios can be sustained. According to Director Inoue, there are high hopes on the festival to help break through the various divisions– ‘commercial’ and ‘artistic’, ‘domestic’ and ‘international’, ‘specialist’ and ‘public’ – in the anime culture.

Around this same time, Tokyo Anime Awards Festival 2023 will also kick off on 10-13 March, while AnimeJapan should also be held in Tokyo later in March as in previous years.
With Japan gradually reopening its borders for international tourists, March next year is definitely going to be an exciting time for many anime fans out there.

About 1st Niigata Animation Film Festival

Niigata is home to many anime/manga-related creators like Shinji Mizushima (Dokaben, Abu-san) and Rumiko Takahashi (Urusei Yatsura, Ranma 1/2, Inuyasha); the Niigata City Manga and Anime Information Center; the Niigata City Manga House which has over 10,000 mangas/comics. It has hosted the Niigata Anime/Manga Festival attended by around 50,000 people each year.

Name: Niigata Animation Film Festival
Date: 17–22 March 2023
Venue: 4 locations in Niigata City, including Niigata Shimin Plaza
Event/Programmes: full-length film competition, 7 sections of screening events and cultural programmes
Number of works: 25-35 films from Japan and abroad are expected to be screened
Type of screened films: theatrical features, features from streaming platforms, tv series reformatted as features
Competition entries: Works will be accepted starting November 2022
Website: https://niigata-iaff.net/

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