Bela Tarr To Receive Lifetime Achievement Award At Tokyo Film Festival

Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF) will present a Lifetime Achievement Award to Hungarian filmmaker Bela Tarr in recognition of his “extraordinary career and long-standing contributions to the film industry”.

The award will be presented during a Special Talk event at the festival, featuring Bela Tarr and Japanese filmmaker Yoji Yamada, to be held on November 1 at the festival’s Tokyo Midtown Hibiya venue. TIFF is taking place October 28-November 6. 

Bela Tarr’s credits include the 438-minute film Satantang, which received the Berliner Zeitung Reader’s Jury award at Berlin film festival in 1994; Werckmeister Harmonies, which premiered in Cannes Directors’ Fortnight in 2000, and The Turin Horse, which won the Silver Bear Jury Grand Prix and the FIPRESCI Prize at Berlin in 2011. Since then, he has been working to foster the next generation of filmmakers by establishing a film school in Sarajevo.

In February 2024, Bela Tarr led a filmmaking workshop in Fukushima Prefecture in Japan, during which the participants made short films, and Kaori Oda directed a behind-the-scenes documentary. 

TIFF will also host screenings of the films made in the workshop and a talk event entitled “The Fukushima Hamadori Film, Art and Culture Project × Tokyo International Film Festival 2024 — Fukushima Hamadori as Seen with Béla Tarr”.

TIFF programming director Shozo Ichiyama said: “In 1995, the Tokyo International Film Festival featured Satantango by Bela Tarr, marking a significant historical event. The seven-and-a-half-hour film drew audiences to Theatre Cocoon and captivated them with its unique style that diverged from traditional film narrative. 

“After directing the masterpiece The Turin Horse in 2011, the director shocked the world by announcing his premature retirement. However, Tarr later founded the film school film.factory in Sarajevo and conducted a series of workshops across the world, mentoring and encouraging many young film creators. In recognition of his significant contributions to the film industry worldwide, the Tokyo International Film Festival would like to present Bela Tarr with a Lifetime Achievement Award for his work as a film director and educator.”