Mother’s Letter

My German father was a passionate photographer and amateur filmmaker. His mother was widowed in WWll and lived in Berlin. My father was an only child, and moved to Japan in 1958. There, he made dozens of Super 8 spools, and took thousands of photos. Perhaps he tried to collect impressions to share with his mother in Germany, who never got to visit Japan. Perhaps he processed his experiences through picture-taking. The extent of the archive only became available after his passing, allowing me to unearth the footage used in this film. No one had seen in about 60 years, even my Japanese mother, who features prominently in the shots, had any memory of the material. 

— Sylvia Schedelbauer