Pickles and Komian Club

Overview

A film about the disappearance of something that seemed as though it would always be there: the long-established Maruhachi Yatarazuke pickling company, a shop that bore a key role in the food culture of Yamagata. The Komian Club to which it was attached had supported the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival since 1993, offering a venue for free social interaction. But in April of 2020, it was suddenly announced that the shop and restaurant were shutting down. As the curtain closed on 135 years of business, disappointment spread, along with questions. This film looks at the proprietor who made the painful decision to close the business and at the people who lent support to this space of interaction. It asks what the YIDFF, and what Yamagata itself, meant as experienced through the Komian Club, by filmmakers and audiences from Japan and abroad.