—CAST—
Stanley Minami
captain of the Pink Dolphin
Owner and captain of the Pink Dolphin, a whale-watching boat service that caters to both Japanese and foreign tourists, Stanley grew up fishing and swimming in the Pacific Ocean. Unlike many of his friends, Stanley was never able to leave the island at or after the islands’ return to Japan.
Irene Savory Lambert
School Teacher
A school teacher in Colorado Springs, and church and organic farm volunteer who once loathed being called a "farmer’s daughter," Irene used to go to the Navy dump to read discarded novels that she could not obtain otherwise. She married her American husband in Guam before moving to Colorado in her early 20s, where she was forced to quickly adapt to an unfamiliar climate while often feeling alone.
John Washington
Innkeeper of the banana Inn
The owner of the Banana Inn, the business he inherited from his parents, John raises the American flag every morning―an homage to the "founding father" of Chichijima, Nathaniel Savory, who apparently did the same whenever a ship called in the bay. He joined the U.S. army after the reversion of the islands to Japan to gain American citizenship and ended up serving 23 years. Teaching the Islanders' heritage to Japanese residents and visitors is a must, he says.
Rance Ohira
Owner of yankee town
The owner of Yankee Town, a wood cabin bar on the outskirts of the main town, Rance remembers making fireworks with gunpowder extracted from bombs left over from the Second World War. After his graduation from high school in Guam, Rance went on to have a long, successful career as an engineer in the United States before he returned to the island when his dad died. He remains attached to the island while objecting to much of what has happened since the return of his birthplace to Japan.
George Yokota
retired school principal
An inspiring teacher and principal of the Admiral Radford School where Chichijima kids took lessons from him in learning English, George Yokota understood the young islanders' complicated language abilities and identities when instilling them with an American cultural base—what their parents and the Navy had trouble doing.
Rocky Savory
Chairman of the BITC Co-Op
The chairman of the co-op store that is named after a Navy-era general store where the Bonin Islanders could shop, Rocky is a community leader of sorts. While younger than the rest of the Navy-era islanders, he is active in keeping parts from the island's past alive.
"We're kind of an endangered species. When we're gone, ah, we're gone."
/ irene lambert /
—CREW—
Masa Fox
Director & Editor
Masa Fox is an award winning Japanese American filmmaker who grew up in Japan and now calls Los Angeles his home. His multicultural background and interests in "in-between-ness" has been the basis for his films, including his debut documentary feature Between Tides about the mixed race Bonin Islanders whose lives were irrevocably changed by the alternating Japanese and American control of their islands. His films have screened at film festivals in both the U.S. and Japan, including the Hawaii International Film Festival and the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival. He is currently developing a feature screenplay about the multicultural military community living in and around the American bases in Okinawa.
Find Masa's website here.
フォックス雅彦は東京で生まれ、京都と北米で育った。日本語と英語のバイリンガルで、彼の多文化的な経歴が今までの作品の背景となっている。その中でSan Diego Asian Film Festivalで上映された『It Ain’t Necessarily So』は日本でのジャズ世界観や文化の盗用の複雑さを題材にした。今回の作品はボニン・アイランダーというあまり知られていない少数派の戦後を記録する。日本でいう「欧米系」の人生は日本➜米合衆国➜日本と統治権が変わり、思いもよらない方向に移行させられた。今年のHawaii International Film Festival Spring Showcaseで上映された『Between Tides』はフォックス監督のドキュメンタリー映画のデビューであり、１０月の山形国際ドキュメンタリー映映画祭は日本でのプレミア上映になる。フォックス監督はCalifornia Institute of the Artsの大学院でAdele Horn教授の下でMFA学位を取得した。
Charles Fox
Producer
Charles Fox hails from Texas but has spent most of the past 45 years living and working in Japan. Educated at Williams College (BA) and the University of Michigan (MA, PhD), he is an emeritus professor at RItsumeikan University in Kyoto and presently serves as principal of Ritsumeikan Uji Junior and Senior High School. His research interest in Japanese literature and culture led him to Chichijima in 2009 because of the poet Kitahara Hakushū's brief connection to the island, but while carrying out that research he made the personal discovery of the little-known Bonin Islanders, whose history he felt cried out to be explored.
Daniel Long
Producer
An Associate Professor of Japanese Linguistics at Tokyo Metropolitan University, his research focuses on the creole language of the Bonin Islands and in particular those that grew up during the U.S. Navy occupation. Daniel has published widely in both English and Japanese, including the seminal work on English language development on the Bonin Islands.
Boon Fox
Producer
Boon Fox is a Japanese and American producer who most recently worked for producers Albert Berger and Ron Yerxa of Bona Fide Productions (Election, Cold Mountain, Little Miss Sunshine, Nebraska). He was part of the development and production of many films, including Nebraska, Charlie Countryman, and the HBO series The Leftovers. Boon attended the Producers Program at UCLA where he developed a feature screenplay, Paint It Black, which won the prestigious Samuel Goldwyn Award for Best Screenplay.
Sawako Murotani
Producer
Sawako Murotani is a native of southern Osaka Prefecture. After studying English Literature at Shitennoji Women’s College, she worked at an English conversation school and taught English at various junior and senior high schools in the greater Osaka area. Reversion of the Bonin/Ogasawara Islands to Japan in 1968 spurred in her a desire to visit the remote islands that she wasn’t able to satisfy until March of 2009, and that visit led to her meeting a number of the descendants of the island’s original settlers and a desire to know more about them.
