A staffer of the Robot production house, where he has worked as an assistant director on entries in the hit "Always" and "Odoru Daisosasen (Bayside Shakedown)" series, 29-year-old Yukinori Makabe has also directed award-winning short films, including "The Sun and the Moon," which beat out 250 others to win the Grand Prix of the Journey Award 2012 short-film contest sponsored by Louis Vuitton. His latest film, "Tokyo Sky Story," will be shown at the Space 634 theater at Tokyo Skytreetown to celebrate the first anniversary of Tokyo Skytree, and as a special screening of Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia. At the Robot headquarters in Ebisu, a very young-looking, but poised and articulate Makabe explained how the film came to be made.
Did you feel any pressure after you got the commission to make the film?
First, I saw an ad calling for proposals for a film with the Skytree as its subject. It came from the Short Shorts Film Festival, which was recruiting ideas from everybody, not just Robot. I made a proposal and it was selected. There wasn't a lot of time from the decision to make (the film) until the start of shooting. It was a tight schedule, so I didn't have time to feel any pressure.