Shinobu Yaguchi

Shinobu Yaguchi (矢口史靖; born 30 May 1967) is a Japanese film director and screenwriter. He specializes in feel-good "zero to hero" films, where a group of people take up an unlikely activity, face a number of obstacles, but finally succeed. His film Waterboys was particularly successful and led to a TV series which entered its third season in 2005. He was awarded Best Screenplay at the 2005 Yokohama Film Festival for his film Swing Girls.

Director

 * Happy Flight


 * 2004 Swing Girls This comedy follows the unlikely (but fact-based) story of a group of girls who decide to form, of all things, a traditional jazz band. The cast is largely cast with actual members of the band performing their own numbers, mostly while wearing their high school sailor suit uniforms.


 * 2002 Parco Fiction


 * 2001 Waterboys The high concept, high school comedy is, like his later "Swing Girls," based in fact.  This film relates the travails of a group of teenage boys who seek fame in, of all ventures, the world of synchronized swimming.  This was later made into a popular eleven-part drama shown on Japanese TV.


 * 1999 One Piece! A series of short films made in conjunction with Takuji Suzuki. The rules: the directors must create a short film without the use of any camera movement or editing - a story told in "one piece" of celluloid. This experiment enjoyed great success on the film festival circuit, and is now only available on an extended Japanese-only DVD. Not to be confused with the anime series.


 * 1999 Adorenarin doraibu aka Adrenaline Drive. This widely-distributed low-budget romance tells the story of young driver's unfortunate encounter with yakuza gone bad - and the strange, terrifying chase that results.


 * 1997 Himitsu no hanazono aka My Secret Cache The hilarious comedy of a bank teller who hopes she'll somehow luck into a vast sum of cash - and does, only to have it slip from her fingers. The film evolves into a series of wild adventures as she tries to regain that lost wealth. Not to be confused with the drama series.


 * 1996 Bird Watching This short film won acclaim in several international film festivals.


 * 1993 Hadashi no pikunikku aka Down the Drain This black comedy is an inversion of his later "Himitsu no hanazono" - a madcap series of misadvantures that chases our heroine through a less-than-friendly depiction of modern Japan.