Photo/Illutration A scene from “Village” ((c) 2023 “Village” Production Committee)

HIROSHIMA--Featuring films themed on the host city and yearning for a world without conflict, the Hiroshima International Film Festival (HIFF) will be held Nov. 23-26.

This year marks the 15th installment since its predecessor event started.

The NTT Cred Hall in the city’s Naka Ward will serve as the main venue, along with two other locations, where 25 films from eight countries, including Japan, will be showcased.

It will open with “Village” by Michihito Fujii of “The Journalist” fame. Fujii won two awards at the predecessor event.

His latest work is set in a small settlement community that shuns interference from the outside.

On Nov. 26, Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s “Evil Does Not Exist” will be shown for the first time in Japan. It won the second prize, the Silver Lion, at the Venice International Film Festival earlier this year.

Other films to be screened include Yuya Ishii’s “The Moon,” which was inspired by a stabbing rampage known as the Tsukui Yamayuri-en mass murder case at a care home in Sagamihara, Kanagawa Prefecture, for people with disabilities that left 19 people dead and 26 injured in 2016.

“The Heart of Hiroshima,” a 1966 film starring Sayuri Yoshinaga about a young woman who falls in love with a man stricken with a radiation-related disease, will be shown at the Hiroshima City Cinematographic and Audio-Visual Library, also in Naka Ward.

A special program dedicated to Yoji Yamada, who has shot many films in Hiroshima Prefecture over the years, will also be on offer.

In addition, a short film competition with entries from across the world will be held for the first time in four years.

“We hope it will serve as a starting point for audience members to turn their eyes toward films from home and abroad that are themed on Hiroshima,” said Kyoko Heya, who serves as president of the festival.

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