Naoko Ogigami

Her filmography is typified by their minimalistic quality and a common theme of questioning national identity. At the 2008 Berlin International Film Festival Megane won the Manfred Salzgeber Award, for "broadening the boundaries of cinema today."

• Name — Naoko Ogigami • Native Name — 荻上 直子 • Born — 15 February 1972 • Birthplace — Chiba Prefecture, Japan • Occupation — Director, screenwriter, cinematographer • Years Active — 1999–present

Ogigami attended Chiba University's Image Science program with an initial interest in photography and learning the science of creating images. Eventually deciding against pursuing photography, Ogigami then turned to studying film due to her fascination with moving images. After graduating in 1994, she moved to the United States to study film at the University of Southern California. There she studied for six years, learning English and completing a graduate degree in film production. Upon returning to Japan in 2000, she initially struggled to find a job and reacclimate herself back into Japanese society before she began writing and directing films.

While living in the United States, Ogigami worked on several short films, television shows, and commercials as a cinematographer, camera operator, and production assistant. She also wrote and directed two short films, Ayako (1999) and Hoshino-kun, Yumino-kun (2001). Yumino-kun won 3 different awards at the PIA Film Festival the year it premiered. Her first feature film, Yoshino's Barber Shop premiered at the PIA Film Festival in and the Berlin International Film Festival in 2004, winning awards at both. Her next feature film, Love is Five, Seven, Five! was released a year later in 2005. In 2006 her third film Kamome Diner was given a limited release in Japan. It would later go on to tour a number of festivals, and was awarded the 5th Best Film at the Yokohama Film Festival in 2007. In 2008 Glasses, her fourth film, was featured at the Berlin International Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, and San Francisco International Film Festival, though it first premiered a year earlier. At the Berlin International Film Festival, Glasses was nominated for and won the Manfred Salzgeber Award for "broadening the boundaries of cinema today." The film was also nominated for the Grand Jury Prize for Dramatic World Cinema, though it lost to Jens Jonssen's The King of Ping Pong. In 2008, she also helped found the production company Suurkiitos, which is the Finnish word for "thank you very much." The company handles advertising, actor management, and film distribution. Her two subsequent films were distributed through the company. After a break in writing and directing, her next film Toilet was given limited theatrical release in Japan and South Korea in 2010, and went on to tour the festival circuit, being shown in festivals in Canada, the United States, Japan, and Taiwan. Her film Rent-a-Cat premiered in 2012 at the Stockholm International Film Festival, and was later nominated for Best Feature at Oslo Films From The South Festival. In 2017, Ogigami released her film Close-Knit, which garnered great success overseas. The film was selected for the Panorama section at the 67th Annual Berlin International Film Festival, which specifically features queer cinema, and won the Panorama Audience Award. The film was also presented with the Teddy Award, given to films which center LGBT topics, becoming the first Japanese film to be granted this title.

• Saboten Journey (2004) • Yappari Neko Ga Suki (2005) • 2Cool (2008) • Roudokuya (2017) • Rilakkuma and Kaoru (2019) • Coffee Ikaga Deshou (2021) • Modern Love Tokyo (2022, episode 4)

Ogigami's films have increasingly gained critical attention both domestically and overseas after their success at multiple film festivals both in Japan and abroad. When asked about one of the practices characters participate in with Glasses, she commented, "Somehow Glasses went to lots of film festivals. And especially European and American people think that twilighting means something about Zen spirit, like in Buddhism. But I always answered that maybe this is just because I grew up in Japan and I have those kind of things in my mind..." In a discussion of her 2017 film Close-Knit, Ogigami states that the film, which deals with issues of transgender identity within contemporary Japanese society, was received well in the larger cities Tokyo and Osaka. However, the films were less successful in more rural areas of Japan, to which Ogigami expressed her surprise: "I didn’t expect it because we have a popular show on TV with a big transgender star, a comedy that we love and appreciate, but I guess that if LGBT people are in the family or neighborhood, that is a totally different story, they are not accepted." Regardless, the film was received well overseas, earning the Panorama Audience Award and becoming the first Japanese film to win the Teddy Award at the Berlin International Film Festival.

• Ayako (short) (1999) • Hoshino-kun, Yumino-kun (short) (2001) • Yoshino's Barber Shop (2004) • Love Is Five, Seven, Five! (2005) • Kamome Diner (2006) • Glasses (2007) • Toilet (2010) • Rent-a-Cat (2012) • Close-Knit (2017) • Riverside Mukolitta (2022) • Ripples (2023) • Maru (2024)