LIM KAH WAI RETROSPECTIVE

A Transnational Journey Across 15 Years of Cinema

Venue(s): K2 Shimokita Cinema
From March 20 (Fri), 2026
Language: Multi-languages with Japanese/English subtitles
Official website: k2-cinema.com/event/title/662
Theater website: k2-cinema.com/
Theater website: k2-cinema.com/access
Theater website: k2-cinema.com/en
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Advance tickets: https://k2-cinema.com/
Talk event: Please check with the theater.

Title: 境界を超える無国籍映画“シネマドリフター”リム・カーワイ─新世界の夜明け─ Director: Lim Kah Wai (リム・カーワイ)

This exciting retrospective spotlights the border-crossing cinema of Lim Kah Wai, the Malaysian-born, Osaka-based filmmaker whose work — like the man himself — moves fluidly between countries, languages, and cultures. Spanning 2010 to 2024, the program brings together 10 features that reflect Lim’s uniquely nomadic filmmaking style — intimate stories shaped by migration, displacement, and global interconnectedness. Despite his international reputation, his work has not been screened in Japan with English subtitles… until now. Run, don’t walk to Shimokita!

The lineup begins with the director’s 2010 debut, which he also wrote and produced, a practice he has maintained to this day (with only 2 exceptions). The newly remastered suspense film After All These Years (アフター・オール・ディーズ・イヤーズ) (Malaysia/China/Japan, 98 min.) was shot in China, where Lim went to the Beijing Film Academy, and follows a man who returns to his hometown, only to discover that no one at all remembers him. It will be presented in a 2025 digital restoration.

Magic and Loss (マジック＆ロス) (81 min.), also from 2010, is an ambitious multinational collaboration spanning Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Hong Kong, China, France, and the USA. It stars erstwhile Japanese indie queen Kiki Sugino and Korean actress Kim Kkobbi as two travelers who meet by chance on a resort island and bond in rather surprising ways, as well as indie hero Yang Ik-june (Breathless), and premiered at the Busan International Film Festival.

Subsequent works also include cast members from multiple countries and a mélange of languages (with wordplay in all of them), and trace Lim’s evolving border-free scope:

New World (新世界の夜明け) (Japan/China, 93 min., 2011)
An affluent young woman who was raised in Beijing visits Japan to revel in having the best Christmas ever. But she finds herself in the seedy Shinsekai district of Osaka, rather than the chic, sleek city she imagined. “This place looks shabbier than Beijing did 20 years ago!” she exclaims. Her encounters with locals are funny, touching, revealing and sometimes eye opening, providing a nice comparative study of cultural differences and similarities.

Fly Me to Minami (恋するミナミ) (Japan/Singapore, 106 min., 2013)
Characters from Hong Kong, Osaka, Seoul and beyond converge on Osaka’s trendy Minami eating/shopping area, in this story of itinerant souls seeking companionship in the period before Christmas. Several new romances are ignited, showcasing Lim’s effortless way of bringing together people who barely speak each other’s language, yet are able to build convincing relationships.

No Where, Now Here (どこでもない、ここしかない) (Slovenia/Macedonia/Malaysia/Japan, 90 min., 2018)
Lim’s first Eastern European film provides a slice of life from the Balkans, focusing on an ethnic Turk, Ferdi, who operates guesthouses and apartments in Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia. Tired of his wandering eye, his wife finally leaves and returns to her Macedonian hometown, a move that finally convinces Ferdi he can’t live without her.

Somewhen, Somewhere (いつか、どこかで) (Serbia/Croatia/Montenegro/Macau/Japan/Malaysia, 81 min., 2019)
In this Balkan adventure by foot and phone, a young woman named Adela travels from Macao to Zagreb to visit the Museum of Broken Relationships, where she’s left behind her late boyfriend’s iphone, and winds up following someone named Alex, whom she met on Instagram, to Belgrade. While she waits for his arrival, Adela encounters a range of fellow travelers and as she exchanges stories with them, begins to see the world in a much different light.

Come and Go (カム・アンド・ゴー) (Japan/Malaysia, 158 min., 2020)
If ever there was proof that Japan’s homogeneity is pure myth, this ensemble dramedy set among Osaka’s melting-pot culture is it. The final film in Lim’s Osaka trilogy (after 2011’s New World and 2013’s Fly Me to Minami), Come and Go firmly establishes the city’s cred as the Gateway to the East, highlighting stories that encompass nearly a dozen nationalities. Among the many unforgettable interludes is the one with Taiwanese star Lee Kang-sheng, who plays an adult-film fan tracking down his favorite actress; and another in which indie film stalwart Makiko Watanabe begins a bittersweet affair with a Nepali man, much to her own surprise.

Your Lovely Smile (あなたの微笑み) (Japan, 100 min., 2022)
Everyone’s favorite cameoing director, Hirobumi Watanabe (And the Mud Ship Sails Away, Techno Brothers), gets the full-length treatment he clearly deserves in this hilarious and heartfelt ode to filmmaking and dying cinema culture. Playing a (slightly?) fictionalized version of himself, Watanabe endures a cringeworthy episode in Okinawa trying to please a shady producer (Shogen, a Lim regular) and then begins to traverse Japan seeking arthouse cinemas that will screen a retrospective of his work. Along the way, we meet legendary theater owners and hear their sad stories about the dearth of audiences — and watch as the self-proclaimed “world-famous director” Watanabe is finally moved to take a drastic step.

This Magic Moment (ディス・マジック・モーメント) (Japan, 90 min., 2023)
Inspired by the experience of incorporating snippets of interviews with arthouse cinema (mini-theater”) owners in Your Lovely Smile, Lim’s next film was a documentary that takes a more in-depth look at the state of cinema projection in Japan. While some 600 films are produced in the country every year, the majority of them are screened at these mini-theaters or not at all — and the theaters themselves operate in a financial-crisis state, especially after Covid. The doc follows Lim as he visits 22 of these historic properties and talks with the resilient owners, some of them 2nd- and 3rd-generation proprietors.

Everything, Everywhere (すべて、至るところにある) (Japan, 88 min., 2024)
Lim’s latest work riffs on the titles of several earlier works, and is once again set in Eastern Europe, mixing professional actors with locals and drama with documentary. Eva (Adela Sou of Somewhen, Somewhere) is a young wanderer who meets film director Jay (Shogen) in North Macedonia and then spends most of the film trying to find him after they part. As it skips around in time and place, we see Jay meeting up with characters from Lim’s No Where, Now Here, and listening to men in Bosnia and Herzegovina reminisce about the war 30 years ago. It’s clear that Jay is a stand-in for Lim, and even if Eva can’t find him, he’s still out there, scouting his next film.

This retrospective offers a rare opportunity to experience the full arc of Lim Kah Wai’s transnational cinema on the big screen, and with subs. Although he has often hinted that he’s ready to retire, the self-dubbed Cinema Drifter fully embodies the spirit of global independent filmmaking in the 21st century — and retirement is not an option. Not with so many stories still to be told.

Talk Events:

K2 Shimokita Cinema