PROJECT INFORMATION Original title “Nemuri Yusurika” Directed

Original title “Nemuri Yusurika”
Directed by Katsumi Sakaguchi
This film illustrates sorrow, hope, and human dignity through the life of a family.
A girl was raped at 15, and then she was pregnant, giving birth to a daughter. 17 years later mother,
daughter, and grandfather live a meager life together from their van. The mother and daughter are in
search for the rapist, while the daughter cares for her grandfather who is unable to use his legs. One day,
they finally find the rapist, but he is in bedridden with terminal cancer...
※Original title ” Nemuri Yusurika(Sleeping chironomid)” is the only known life form that can survive in liquid
helium at temperatures as low as 3 kelvin. Besides that, it can survive temperatures up to 375 K,
gamma-rays, dehydration, and vacuum too. It is a type of insect (a fly) and could be classified as an
extremophile. They have surprising vitality.
PROJECT INFORMATION
Format: Color, Cinemascope Running Time: 96min
Genre: Drama Language: Japanese (with English subtitles for viewing)
Delivery… January 2011
Cast: Mariko Hirano, Aimi Kobayashi, Miyuki Komagata, Takushi Iwao
Location: Japan
Review
Sleep is an impressively subversive and grim tale, but also well made and disturbingly watchable.
The travails of this tremendously tormented family make for almost Shakespearian viewing, but despite the
underlying bleakness of the revenge plot there is an astonishing amount of odd uninhibited warmth
between the threesome. The three happily bathe together, laughing as they clean each other, and their
honest loyalty and affection acts as a delightful counterbalance to the almost hysterical darkness of the
brutality and death that surround them.
Shot in a dark as realistic manner, Sleep is an impressively subversive and grim tale, but also well made
and disturbingly watchable.
“Screen International “ Screen daily Review (31 January, 2011) By Mark Adams, chief film critic
Director, writer, cinematographer, editor: Katsumi SAKAGUCHI
Born in Kagoshima, 1955. He has made more than 100 documentaries
dealt with the problems of young people and families in difficult
circumstances as TV director and producer. He has written and directed
three feature films "Blue Tower"(00) and “Catharsis” (02) . “Blue Tower”
portrays a young man suffering from self-inflicted isolation and “Catharsis”
portrays a boy who committed a crime. Both are independent films, made
on very low budgets but both films were very well received at festivals and
had theatrical releases in Japan and Germany. “Sleep” is his third film.
His fourth film is feature documentary "Atomic Bomb Home", It observes
people living in Genbaku (Atomic Bomb) Home, which is a nursing home
for aged Atomic-bomb victims.
His next project “Eternal Forest” (Feature film: In development / DOP: Vadim Yusov (Ivan's Childhood,
Andrei Rublev, Solaris)) was officially selected for the Berlin International Film Festival “Co-Production
Market 2008” .
“The Angelus” (Documentary Film: In production) was officially selected for the Tokyo International Film
Festival co-production market - Tokyo Project Gathering (TPG) 2009.
Cameo role, Piano: Aimi Kobayashi
She is a most famous young (Age 14) classical pianist born on September 23, 1995. She played with an orchestra at
age 7, and has won many prizes (International Chopin Piano Competition in ASIA). Release her debut CD from EMI
Classics in February 2010. AADGT (The American Association for Development of the Gifted and Talented), a New
York based non-profit organization, has been actively supporting and helping Aimi for many years.
She will held Solo recital at Carnegie Hall
(New York, USA) in April 3rd 2011.( “Japan
NYC” is a festival of Japanese music and
other cultural forms that will be led by Seiji
Ozawa, subject to his recovery from cancer.
The festival will include concerts by some of
Japan's top musicians, including violinist
Midori Goto, pianist Aimi Kobayashi, jazz
pianist Toshiko Akiyoshi and shamisen player
Yutaka Oyama.)
Producer Atsuko Ochiai
Music
Tetsuhide Hidaka
Sound Design Tsutomu Honda
International Coordination Toshiyuki Hasegawa
Production Company
SUPERSAURUS
（Address）1-6-6 Irifune,Chuou-ku,Tokyo 104-0042 Japan
（Phone）+81 3 3551 55 30 （Fax）+81 3 6893 6516
www.supersaurus.jp [email protected]
SUPERSAURUS was established in 1999 by TV director and producer Katsumi Sakaguchi, and Atsuko Ochiai, as a
total visual production company. It produces a wide variety of visual materials, which include feature films, television
programs, and books. They have made four feature films to date: BLUE TOWER (2000 /Silver Award at the 2001
Houston International Film Festival) and CATHARSIS (2002). Both of them are released in 2003 in Japan and Munich.
SLEEP (2011, 96 min) was world premiered at the 40th International Film Festival Rotterdam in 2011 and released in
Japan in autumn 2011. Latest film is feature documentary "Atomic Bomb Home" released in Japan in August 2012.