Amarela
TITLE
Amarela
DIRECTOR
André Hayato Saito
COUNTRY
Brazil
YEAR
2024
DURATION
15′
GENRE
Fiction
Amarela
On the day of the World Cup final between Brazil and France, Erika Oguihara, a Japanese-Brazilian teenager who rejects her family traditions, experiences a violence that seems invisible and plunges into a painful sea of emotions.
DIRECTOR BIOGRAPHY - André Hayato Saito
André Hayato Saito is a Japanese-Brazilian screenwriter and director. Since 2019, Saito has been working on a short film trilogy that embraces his Japanese-Brazilian roots, delving into themes of identity, life and death cycles, and ancestrality. The first short film of the sequence was "KOKORO TO KOKORO", a short documentary selected for the 40th Uruguay Int’l Film Festival, 24th Rio de Janeiro Int'l Film Festival, Roma Short Film Festival (Best Short Documentary), Tokyo Int’l Short Film Festival (Honorable Mention). The second, "WIND OF GOLD", a docufiction, premiered at the 46th Moscow Int’l Film Festival and was also screened at the 31st Sheffield Doc Fest, 20th FEST – New Directors | New Films and 35th Kinoforum: São Paulo Int'l Short Film Festival. The third one, "AMARELA", is a fiction selected for the Official Short Film Competition at the 77th Festival de Cannes, the 49th TIFF, 45th Habana Film Festival (Best Short Film - Premio Coral Especial), 47th Clermont-Ferrand, 42nd Festival Tous Courts (Grand Prix), 26th Rio Int'l Film Festival, among others. It was also featured in a question on the 2025 entrance exam (Vestibular 2025) of UNESP, one of Brazil’s largest universities. All these short films will lead to his debut feature film entitled "YELLOW CHRYSANTHEMUM", which continues to explore these themes. Currently in the funding stage, the project has been selected for several labs and markets such as Torino Feature Lab 2024 (where it won the Production Award), Cannes Focus COPRO 2024, Ontario Creates (IFF) 2022, TIFF Filmmaker Lab 2021, Shanghai Film Market 2021, Florianopolis Audiovisual Mercosul (FAM) 2021, and was also a semifinalist at FRAPA 2021, a famous screenplay contest in Brazil. In recent years, Saito has been selected for other important labs like Berlinale Talents Buenos Aires 2022, Interaction: Doc Workshop 2023, and Playlab's Apichatpong immersion 2023, in addition to teaching directing classes at the Beijing Film Academy. He was also invited to be one of the creative mentors of the "Amplifica Cine" program, which empowers 10 promising young filmmakers from the Sao Paulo outskirts.
- DirectorAndré Hayato Saito
- ScreenplayAndré Hayato Saito
- Cinematography
- Cast
- Editing
- Producer/s Mayra Faour Auad, Gabrielle Auad
- Production CompanySalaud Morisset Sales Agent Germany All Rights
- Distributor/s
- Project TitleAmarela
- Project TypeFiction
- Completion Date1 January 2024
- Country of originBrazil
- Country of filmingBrazil
- LanguageJapanese, Portuguese
- First-time Filmmaker No
- Student ProjectNo
André Hayato Saito
André Hayato Saito is a Japanese-Brazilian screenwriter and director. Since 2019, Saito has been working on a short film trilogy that embraces his Japanese-Brazilian roots, delving into themes of identity, life and death cycles, and ancestrality. The first short film of the sequence was "KOKORO TO KOKORO", a short documentary selected for the 40th Uruguay Int’l Film Festival, 24th Rio de Janeiro Int'l Film Festival, Roma Short Film Festival (Best Short Documentary), Tokyo Int’l Short Film Festival (Honorable Mention). The second, "WIND OF GOLD", a docufiction, premiered at the 46th Moscow Int’l Film Festival and was also screened at the 31st Sheffield Doc Fest, 20th FEST – New Directors | New Films and 35th Kinoforum: São Paulo Int'l Short Film Festival. The third one, "AMARELA", is a fiction selected for the Official Short Film Competition at the 77th Festival de Cannes, the 49th TIFF, 45th Habana Film Festival (Best Short Film - Premio Coral Especial), 47th Clermont-Ferrand, 42nd Festival Tous Courts (Grand Prix), 26th Rio Int'l Film Festival, among others. It was also featured in a question on the 2025 entrance exam (Vestibular 2025) of UNESP, one of Brazil’s largest universities. All these short films will lead to his debut feature film entitled "YELLOW CHRYSANTHEMUM", which continues to explore these themes. Currently in the funding stage, the project has been selected for several labs and markets such as Torino Feature Lab 2024 (where it won the Production Award), Cannes Focus COPRO 2024, Ontario Creates (IFF) 2022, TIFF Filmmaker Lab 2021, Shanghai Film Market 2021, Florianopolis Audiovisual Mercosul (FAM) 2021, and was also a semifinalist at FRAPA 2021, a famous screenplay contest in Brazil. In recent years, Saito has been selected for other important labs like Berlinale Talents Buenos Aires 2022, Interaction: Doc Workshop 2023, and Playlab's Apichatpong immersion 2023, in addition to teaching directing classes at the Beijing Film Academy. He was also invited to be one of the creative mentors of the "Amplifica Cine" program, which empowers 10 promising young filmmakers from the Sao Paulo outskirts.
