Yanagawa Horiwari Monogatari, which translates to The Story of Yanagawa Waterways, is a 1987 live-action documentary film directed by Isao Takahata and produced by Hayao Miyazaki. It details a region in southern Japan populated by hundreds of canals, waterways and bridges. It looks like a rural Venice, and is endlessly fascinating. The movie chronicles the complex system of waterways, its history and evolution, and the tribulations of surviving the pollution and Westernization of post-war Japan, including the destruction and eventual restoration of the natural environment.
Yanagawa is blessed with cinematography that is beautiful, wonderfully saturated with rich color tones. Every shot is glorious and you just want to soak it all in. Takahashi Somai is credited as the man behind the camera, but nothing is known of him apart from this film project. More investigation is needed.
I snapped these screenshots of the DVD playing on the family Sony Bravia HDTV, and captured using an iPad. I've been taking screenshots this way for an ongoing series of Sega Saturn essays on NeoGAF, and it's a nice change of pace. I almost always took photos directly from the computer via VLC or another media software program.
I'll have to capture more screenshots of this excellent documentary, which remains largely unknown even by dedicated Ghibli Freaks. The DVD and Blu-Ray (as part of the Isao Takahata Blu-Ray collection) were never released outside of Japan. That needs to change. GKIDS or Criterion should pick up this title for a North American release.
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