Late Oscar-winning Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto was celebrated at the Venice Film Festival on Tuesday with the Out Of Competition premiere of concert film Opus.
The moving black-and-white work captures Sakamoto delivering his final performance in the months leading up to his death in March after a seven-year battle with cancer.
Alone with his piano on stage, he performs twenty of his compositions, spanning the music of his pop-star Yellow Magic Orchestra period to his first film score for Merry Christmas Mr.
Lawrence; his Oscar-winning music for Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor and his final album, 12. Sakamoto’s filmmaker and artist son Neo Sora, who directed the film, was in Venice to present the work. “I think he would have really loved that the film plays in Venice.
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