Ghost Cat & The Mysterious Shamisen - 2012 Shinsedai Cinema Festival @ The Revue Cinema

Co-presented with the Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival, and presented with the special cooperation of Japan's National Film Center.

EXPLORE THE ROOTS OF J-HORROR WITH THE GHOSTLY TALE OF A FIERY LOVE TRIANGLE AND A FELINE SPIRIT THAT RETURNS FROM THE GRAVE TO SEEK VENGEANCE.

The Shinsedai Cinema Festival is very proud to be bringing Kiyohiko Ushihara’s 1938 horror film The Ghost Cat and the Mysterious Shamisen to Toronto for the first time. This rarely screening classic is one of the finest examples of a lost genre from the Golden Age of Japanese films.

Mitsue, portrayed by Japan’s first “Scream Queen” Sumiko Suzuki, is a hot tempered actress engaged to shamisen player Seijiro. The lives of this couple change one day when Seijiro’s cat runs away. He’s returned by the beautiful Okiya and soon the two fall in love. Jealousy consumes Mitsue and she murders Okiya… and her fiancé’s cat. The ghost of the feline returns from the grave, though, and assists Okiya’s younger sister Onui to avenge the death of her sister at the hands of Mitsue.

Specially subtitled by the JVTA, Japan Visualmedia Translation Academy, ALL PROCEEDS OF THIS SCREENING WILL GO TO BENEFIT THE NIJI-IRO 'RAINBOW' CINEMA SUPPORT PROJECT'S TOHOKU RELIEF EFFORT.

The screening of GHOST CAT AND THE MYSTERIOUS SHAMISEN will be preceded by animator and artist Akino Kondoh's short film KIYAKIYA.