30. Film Festival della Lessinia
Bosco Chiesanuova (Italia)
23 August - 1 September 2024

Italian premiere

Igarashi and Ishitaka are two bokkas. Their job is to carry heavy loads, up to eighty kilograms in weight, on their backs, with goods to be delivered to the shelters that can only be reached on foot in the Oze Natural Park, in the mountains of Japan. The "speed of happiness" for Igarashi, a musician, is to enjoy every day in a different way the same path he has taken for more than twenty years, experiencing the sensations, encounters, silences and "thanks" of the managers of shelters that satisfy him more than the money he receives, consoled, in the evening, by a caring wife and smiling children. Ishitaka has the spirit of a businessman and works tirelessly, injuring his ankle, to present his business as a true professional to the metropolis. One, in winter, earns his living by driving snowplows in ski resorts, the other works as a bokka in the city. In spring they find themselves walking the same path, with the snow not yet melted, each dreaming of a different happiness. Splendid natural scenery provides the background to a small story where the traces of a great inner serenity seem to reside.

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  Hyuckjee Park

  He founded Hiharbor Pictures in 2004 and has directed more than 50 documentaries for the major Korean TV stations. In 2015 his film With or Without You was screened at DOK Leipzig. In the same year he started the production of The Speed of Happiness, which was recently selected as the "Jeonju Cinema Project" at the 2022 Jeonju International Film Festival and premiered in April.