Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn has been named head of the jury at the Tokyo International Film Festival, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
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Gunn’s jury, will judge 15 films in competition, also consists of directors John H. Lee (A Moment to Remember), Robert Luketic (Legally Blonde), John Khoo (Tatsumi), Hiroshi Shinagawa, and casting director Debbie McWilliams.
The festival will host the world premieres of 30 films, including five entered into the main competition.
“Film is a window on the world today, through which we can see its true shape. It is the medium that shows us with the greatest immediacy the vast variety of people on the earth, and how they are all just as human as we are,” said Yoshi Yatabe, festival programming director. “The works in the Competition Section of the Tokyo International Film Festival were selected with the goal of showing our world in a microcosm.”
Directors Tim Burton and Takeshi Kitano will receive the first ever Samurai Awards, created to honor filmmakers who “create groundbreaking films that carve out a path to a new era.”
The festival will kick off with a showing of Disney’s Big Hero 6. Also debuting at the festival is Garm Wars – The Last Druid, the latest project from Mamoru Ishii, the visionary anime creator of Neon Genesis Evangelion, as well as the Pikmin short films created by Nintendo’s legendary video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto.
The festival will take place October 23-31 in Tokyo.
