Review by Anne Thomas

A very nice article by Anne Thomas to compare MENTAL and DEEP IN THE VALLEY, a film by my friend Atsushi Funahashi came out. This is how it starts out:

Japanese cinema at the Berlin Film Festival, which closed on Sunday, was represented by a rich selection that ranged from children’s docu-fiction to hardcore trash. Reporter Anne Thomas was impressed by two films in particular.
"Mental” (“Seishin”), an extremely sensitive documentary by Soda Kazuhiro and “Deep in the Valley” (“Yanaka Boshoku”), a beautifully-shot cross between fiction and documentary by Funahashi Atsushi, both tell the story of communities isolated from the mainstream.

To read the whole article:
http://www2.dw-world.de/southasia/germany/1.234926.1.html