Kazuo Hara and Sachiko Kobayashi first met at the opening of Hara’s 1969 photo exhibition Don’t Make Fun of Me, which consisted of photos taken during his tenure as a helper at a school for disabled children. Kobayashi, then a photographer who had been affected by a bout of polio in her youth, took interest in Hara’s work and approached him. Before long, the pair’s budding personal and professional partnership would lead them to explore the taboo subject of disability in their explosive debut, Goodbye CP. Detailing the lives of two disability activists with cerebral palsy (CP), Hara and Kobayashi’s first collaboration unveils a raw portrait of outcasts who take to the streets to confront a society that tries all it can to ignore their existence. Abrasive and radical, Hara and Kobayashi’s debut establishes the no-holds-barred cinema that would go on to define their careers.
Streaming in the U.S. from June 4-July 2 as part of Cinema as Struggle: The Films of Kazuo Hara & Sachiko Kobayashi
Japanese
English