28th TIFF SAMURAI Award Honorees John Woo & Yoji Yamada

28th TIFF Special Night Event at Kabukiza Theatre Features Leading Actor KATAOKA Ainosuke and Samurai Award Honorees John WOO and Yoji YAMADA (C)2015 TIFF 　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　 Director John Woo I’m incredibly honored and excited to be here tonight, receiving the SAMURAI Award with a great master whom I greatly admire and respect, Mr. Yamada. His films are filled with love and humanity, which is what makes cinema loved around the world. This is the humanity that made me fall in love with movies and decide to devote my life to making them. I watched films from all around the world, especially from Japan, when I started studying film in the 1960s. Japan has had so many great directors, writers and actors, and their work has always influenced me. I don’t think I’ve contributed much, I just work hard at what I do. So this award is beyond my expectations. Thank you to the Tokyo International Film Festival, and to my friends who have acknowledged and supported me all these years. I will continue devoting myself to making better movies. I will try to make better movies. Director Yoji Yamada I’ve been a part of the Tokyo International Film Festival from the very beginning, and my film The Yellow Handkerchief was shown in the first edition. It makes me so happy to receive the Samurai Award here tonight. I’m very honored. But my films aren’t really characterized as having the samurai spirit. I think that’s more the spirit of Mr. Woo’s films, and I’d like to congratulate him. KATAOKA Ainosuke REMARKS DURING PHOTO CALL I am going to do the season’s first performance with Ebizo in Kanjincho in Kyoto, which is the story that tonight’s Kurosawa’s film, They Who Step on the Tiger’s Tail is based on. As an actor, it was a great honor tonight to perform at the event with Kurosawa’s film in Tokyo International Film Festival. I will continue to do my best as a kabuki actor as well as in other roles.