One of Tsuyoshi Domoto’s concerts has been turned into a movie, and the KinKi Kids star turned up to an event in Tokyo yesterday to promote it, reports Daily Sports Online and Kadogawa magazines.
Titled “平安結祈 heianyuki“, the movie shows Tsuyoshi’s solo concert performance on September 4, 2011, which was held at Heian-jingu, a shrine in Kyoto. It has been reported for the past few years, Tsuyoshi has been focussing on making music which looks deep into the Japanese culture. He had previously performed special concerts at Yakushi-ji, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in his hometown Nara.
The Heian-jingu concert included laser beams that light up the shrine’s 117-year-old structure, and a mixture of Japanese taiko drums and electric guitar music. Film director Yukihiko Tsutsumi took on the challenge of making this mash up of the past and present cinematic.
Tsuyoshi and Tsutsumi had previously worked together 14 years ago when they made a “Kindaichi Case Files” movie.
However, Tsuyoshi did not expect the concert to become a movie at all.
“What I wanted to do was make music unlike any other and have someone film me to keep as a record that I was there at that time. I was worried about whether Tsutsumi-san was busy, but I got in touch with him anyway to see if he was interested. Then he said he would, so at that point I knew I had someone to capture the moment on film.
“Afterwards, I was telling him how great it would be if it were a movie, and he told me, ‘I did film it like I’d film a movie’. That’s just how things flowed apparently, really (laughs). And then shortly afterwards it really did become a movie. It’s not that I asked him to film me for a movie. At the beginning the two of us just wanted to make something with a message. But this (movie) made me realize that fate is a strange thing.”
The movie was originally set for a limited screening in 65 cinemas across Japan, but following the Tohoku earthquake, extra screenings were added in Fukushima, Miyagi, Iwate, and Okinawa. It has been reported Tsuyoshi said he hopes the hearts of the Tohoku earthquake victims will heal.
“I think people, particularly those who are younger than me, will have to face the harshness of reality soon. To be able to overcome this, I think it’s important to get away from reality entirely, create a world of your own, and then have another look at reality. This film is like a concert and not a concert, it’s like a movie and not a movie. It’s like reality and not like reality.”
There have also been offers from a number of Asian countries interested in Tsuyoshi’s movie.
“平安結祈 heianyuki” will have a limited screening in Japan from February 24 to March 11.
