It was bittersweet how the Uenoshita Apartments, the last of Tokyo’s 1920s-conceived Dojunkai housing projects, put you in mind of an old movie, just as the entire structure was due for demolition. And now it is gone, like a reel running out. Not all of it became landfill, however: a resurrected remnant stars in a new experimental film.

A three-storey chunk of the old complex was rebuilt at an NHK production facility in Tokyo’s west, with one side left completely exposed, and the resulting cross-section then peopled with pretend residents. Then a new Hi-Vision camera filmed what went on in this Rear Window-like ant-farm, and the result was turned into a 20-minute film named The Chorus. Visual and sound detail, we hear, is astonishing. The producers are using the film to promote the next generation Hi-Vision format, called 8K. With four times the pixels of the latest 4K system, it’s 16-times sharper than current Hi-Vision –  and has 22.2 channels of sound. Music in the film is by saxophonist, composer and aural magician Yasuaki Shimizu, who may be best known for his all-saxophone interpretations of Bach’s Cello Suites. (He also scored the Oscar-nominated documentary about a Japanese artist couple in New York City, Cutie and the Boxer.)* For Chorus, Shimizu recorded his tenor saxophone with 19 microphones placed within the 14-storey atrium of the production laboratories. He says he became a dojunkai ghost for the session. He plays original compositions as well as new versions of the Cello Suites. The Chorus premieres during the Tokyo International Film Festival. A final hurrah of our Dojunkai dreaming….

The Chorus (20min., with English subtitles)
18 October  (Fri) 3pm & 6:45pm
19 October (Sat) 1pm & 5:30pm
20 October (Sun) 3:30pm & 5:30pm
TOHO Cinemas, Roppongi Hills, Screen 3
Free admission
Talk with Ryo Iwamatsu (script) and Yasuaki Shimizu (music) follows second screening on Friday 18 October.
For more information Tokyo International Film Festival
tel. 03-5405-8686

*Information added Jan 25 2014