ame no hi

I was supposed to have met with my stepmom today for lunch and a movie. Instead, we got rained out by severe thunderstorms, timed to coincide with our arrival to Bluffton.
I headed out for Ame No Hi, just down the street at Victory Cinema.
No, that isn't some new term the kids are using these days.
Ame No Hi is Japanese for "A Rainy Day" and the symbol actually depicts it well: a simple framed windowpane with several rain drops on it.
Both modern and timeless.
How incredible that Yuiko Hotta's special film festival had the appropriate weather as its background!
Not that it needed to have happened that way. She had carefully selected the four films because of their usage of rain as a motif to portray a mood and set a scene.
In other words, the rain was part of the cast of "Rashomon", "Grave of the Fireflies", "My Neighbor Totoro", and "Seven Samurai".
Okay, okay, maybe not the cast, but definitely the cinematography, right?
(smile)
I missed the opening speech and the first movie.
Why? Mostly because the sky was pouting bucketfuls of water, continuously. But also, partly, because I had already seen that 1950 Kirosawa movie at least once.
Fortunately, I threw myself out of the house for the rest of the films. The SCAD senior had created this film festival as a thank-you gift to the people of Savannah for so graciously sharing this beautiful town with her. The festival was her way of sharing part of her culture with us.
Have you ever heard of anyone doing such a thing?
How very remarkable! What a gracious act of gratitude!
I, in turn, have much gratitude toward her.
I was there for "Grave of the Fireflies", an absolutely eloquent tale of the effect of war as seen through the eyes of two children. The setting is World War II, in Japan. Don't let the animation make you think this 1988 film is lightweight.
I was there for "My Neighbor Totoro", as well as the pre-film discussion by two of her film professors (Gustafson and Webber). Another 1988 animated creation, this was screened to a sold-out house. Wow! Apparently, the tale of two little girls in a new neighborhood, and the unusual friends they find, is very popular with children here in the States!
(As it turns out, I had already seen this, while going to school in Tallahassee, at a little two-screen arthouse cinema in the 'old' mall. How nice to see it again!)
I was there for the last film, too, a 1954 action classic. Sadly, that was not to screen. It had only been playing for about twenty minutes when the projectors went down. A nearby lightning strike had forced the early end of the film festival.
I walked away with an art book. She had seen me reading it, page by page, after picking it up from her display table. She wanted me to have it, so I could enjoy it over and over.
Domo arigato, Yuiko Hotta, for a memorable day.