Satoshi Kon

I read this morning that Satoshi Kon had passed away. He was only 46. He was a brilliant director and writer. Millennium Actress and Tokyo Godfathers are two of my favorite films of all time. I saw him at Big Apple Anime Fest, probably in 2003, for the first American showing of Tokyo Godfathers. (I remember first seeing Millennium Actress at BAAF also, probably in 2001, but I don’t think he was there for that.) I also got a chance to see him in 2008 for a retrospective at Walter Reade. He seemed like a really nice guy, self-deprecating, but very serious about his work. And he was very Japanese, in a way that’s kind of hard to define, though his work was influenced by both Japanese and American culture. The NY Times obit by A. O. Scott is well-written and I agree with pretty much everything said or quoted therein.

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.