ONE HOT FEST: MANISAY OUDOMVILAY AND THE JAPANESE FILM FESTIVAL

To celebrate the 30th edition of the Japanese Film Festival in Australia, I talk with festival programmer Manisay Oudomvilay about steering the festival from pandemic-era lockdowns to a packed return to cinemas, curating a program that balances crowd-pleasers with a few unpredictable picks, and her highlights of this year's lineup — from the Australian premiere of Hirokazu Kore-eda's Look Back to Kiyoshi Kurosawa's first period drama The Samurai and the Prisoner and the animated sequel Chimney Town: Frozen in Time.