"neo-eiga" returns for a second season with more U.S. premieres of festival favorites, this time including two independent documentaries that entertainingly address issues of nationalism and class while following colorful contenders in the worlds of punk rock and boxing. Another new element in this year's showcase is an experimental personal film (by Akihiro Suzuki), which beautifully explores memory, loss, and the desire for honesty. This insistence upon individual honesty, ever typical of youth, is at the center of Tomoyuki Furumaya's semi-autobiographical film, but seems more remarkable in the stubbornly self-accepting over-thirty salarywoman in the first feature of Kunitoshi Manda, formerly screenwriter and assistant director for Kiyoshi Kurosawa. We offer a rare opportunity to see earlier works by Kurosawa (director of Cure, SFIFF/PFA 1998) which confirm this acclaimed auteur's fluency in shaping different genres to his own unsettling ends. Join us on opening night for the latest film by actor-director Naoto Takenaka, best known here for his scene-stealing roles in Shall We Dance? and Gemini. Fresh in their outlook on relationships and social expectations, skilled in their assimilation of other media as well as film, the seven directors draw us into the contradictions, comforts, and discomforts of contemporary Japan. Advance tickets recommended (510-642-5249). A program guide will be available at the screenings, with essays on Kiyoshi Kurosawa (by Chuck Stephens) and current Japanese documentary (by Aaron Gerow).Cosponsored by the Consulate General of Japan, San Francisco on the fiftieth anniversary of the San Francisco Peace Treaty; The Japan Foundation Los Angeles Office; and Japan Exchange and Teaching Program Alumni Association of Northern California (JETAANC).Programmed by Mona Nagai and Manami Kano.Saturday September 8, 2001