｜Length : 26min ｜Year : 2020 ｜

Taisuke Aono lives in Niihama, Ehime Prefecture.
All he knew how to cook was burnt chicken and yakisoba filled with vegetables. But when his daughter Nat-chan started high school, he decided to start making bento boxes for her.
Nat-chan didn't think he could keep this up for long, since he couldn't stick to a diet, or quit drinking and smoking. And the first bento box he made was a mess...
But her dad kept cooking in the kitchen morning after morning.
All of his bento boxes came with a handwritten menu.
He would give each bento box a title, like "Wimbledon" or "Motivational Katsudon Bento," and would write about Nat-chan's club activities, her tests, events happening in Japan, and updates about his diets.
For three years, he kept making bento boxes and writing menus.
These menus soon became letters from father to daughter.
It wasn't long before he'd made 100, then 500, then nearly 700 lunch boxes. Then came Nat-chan's graduation.
What did he write for his 700th and final menu?

This program depicts the casual life of a single-parent family, and one father's loving bento boxes with humorous and emotional menus.

｜Length : 25min ｜Year : 2020 ｜

The new corona virus is running rampant and many in the entertainment industry are faced with a difficult situation. As musical bands cancel their live gigs one after another, classical music concerts are no exception since despite its size, a concert hall is still a closed space.

When the state of emergency was lifted temporarily and some normalcy returned, Japan's oldest orchestra, the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, welcomed the audience back to their hall. It was an arduous road with a major hurdle being how to attain safe distancing for the performers as well as the concert-goers.

Despite the easing of restrictions, professional sports play games without spectators. So what drove classical musicians to risk their own health to perform a concert? Dealing with the huge obstacles before them, dedication and a passionate love of music guide these music professionals as they prepare for their first concert in months.

｜Length : 25min ｜Year : 2020 ｜

Japan’s mountain-climbing boom has not only led to more climbers of all ages, but an increase in climbers getting lost and injured.

As the nation’s first Doctor of Mountain Medicine, Kazue Ohshiro mans the 24-hour First-Aid Center at Mt. Fuji's Eighth Station where she treats the myriad of ailments that can plague climbers; with little medical equipment. An experienced alpinist who honed her expertise by climbing the world’s most dangerous mountains, she passionately believes that prevention and education are key to raising the low success rate of mountain rescues.

Treating patients in the one-man clinic, she wastes no opportunity to give advice on how not to get lost and to prevent the three main causes of death in the mountains—external injury, heart attack and hypothermia.

It is a passionate summer for this mountain doctor who is doing everything she can to save the lives of climbers.

｜Length : 45 ｜Year : 2019 ｜

On the coast of an inlet in western Ehime Prefecture is the town of Tawarazu. This small community with a population of 1,000 has many elderly residents.
This town has a bento box shop called “Yumesakuya,” run by the 55-year-old Yumiko Utsunomiya. She also delivers meals, to help senior citizens who can’t shop for themselves.
Koume, one of her elderly customers, says to Yumiko, “I’m as helpless as a baby. Don’t leave me alone, please.”
Yumiko’s bento bring the lonely senior citizens comfort, and save their lives.

What is it that drives Yumiko?

“Putting a smile on people’s faces.”

As Japan’s population ages, more and more senior citizens have no means to feed themselves. Tawarazu, which used to prosper from mandarin orange orchards, is no exception.
At “Yumesakuya,” the town’s mothers work hard to save these shopping refugees.
They deliver to the elderly who can’t walk to the store out of a spirit of charity. What would be a ten minute’s walk for a healthy person is impossibly far away for others.
After the heavy rains of July 2018, “Yumesakuya” reopened as a mini-supermarket.
This documentary portrays the plight of shopping refugees, and the powerful lives of the local mothers who stand up for them.

｜Length : 25 ｜Year : 2019 ｜

In a world of mass-production, the “independent watchmaker” creates a watch from scratch - from original design to crafting every, single mechanical piece and putting them together. There are only 31 of them who have been officially certified by the Horological Academy of Independent Creators. Masahiro Kikuno became fascinated in his twenties by a Swiss independent watchmaker, and when he was 30, he became the first Japanese, and youngest ever in the world, to be certified. His creations which feature uniquely Japanesque designs and elaborate precision mechanisms, attract orders from around the world, commanding prices ranging from 45,000 to 160,000 dollars. He makes only two watches a year, hand-making screws as little as 0.001 millimeters. Our cameras follow Kikuno for eight months as he creates a one-of-a-kind timepiece for an overseas client, and delve into why he persists in making something commonly mass-produced with his own hands.