Film "SHUMEI" at the Venice International Film Festival — Screening and Award
Sep 4, 2026 – Sep 5
AwardBest Film, Cinema & Arts Award — official independent award of the 83rd Venice International Film Festival
- Dates
- Sep 4, 2026 – Sep 5
- Area
- Venice, Italy
- Tickets
- See official site
- Officially checked
- Sep 18, 2026
The film "SHUMEI" screened at the 83rd Venice International Film Festival and, on 11 September local time, won Best Film at the festival's official independent award, the Cinema & Arts Award — the first Japanese film to take that prize. Danjūrō walked the red carpet still in kabuki costume — reported as the first time this has been done in full kabuki dress — appeared at the photocall in the same costume, and saw his image carried on the large screen outside the venue. Shumei — the succession of a great stage name — stepped in front of a global audience: a landmark moment in kabuki's journey beyond Japan.
FOR FIRST-TIMERSIf this is your first time
The Venice International Film Festival is the world's oldest film festival. The Cinema & Arts Award, which runs alongside it officially, honours work that fuses cinema with theatre, music and the performing arts — so a film that carried kabuki, a stage art, to a global audience took the prize that bears exactly that name. Photographs from Venice are on this page. The film opens in Japan on 25 September.
Links to: La Biennale di Venezia official page
FROM THE OFFICIAL CHANNEL
KABUKU. / Ichikawa Danjūrō.See it in his own films
【初公開！】襲名で披露予定だった幻のセリフを公開！動画の最後では誰も知らない裏話も⁉︎
Jun 7, 2020
The real events behind the film's subject: Danjūrō speaks aloud, for the first time, the lines prepared for a name-succession announcement that never took place as planned.