Kiriko Mechanicus
Kiriko Mechanicus, also known as Kiri Academy, is an Amsterdam-based Dutch-Japanese documentary filmmaker, writer of fiction and non-fiction, culinary artist, photographer, host, full-time opinionated bitch and part-time party girl.
Her graduation film ‘A TOMATO TRAGEDY’ (2023) won the Filmfonds Wildcard prize. Her debut film ‘HOW TO CATCH A BUTTERFLY’ (2026) premiered at South by South West in Austin, Texas and won the award of best international short film at Millenium Docs against Gravity (Warsaw), IndieLisboa (Portugal) and best national short at LeidenShorts. She directs music videos, short documentaries, television documentaires, experimental videos and babbles about cinema endlessly (publicly). Kiriko often writes for various literary publications such as Vice magazine or Hard//Hoofd. She was once even asked to write a poemfor the visit of Italian president Mattarella at the 30-year anniversary of the European Union in the Netherlands. Occasionally, miss Mechanicus appears on the tellie or in a news-pa-per. She says yes to everything, especially things that she hasn’t done before.
Episodes with Kiriko Mechanicus (29)
- Can Cinema Show Us What We Can’t See? — NFF Special w/ Amanda van Hesteren & Emma Lesuis
- Did Terminator 2 Ruin How We Imagine The End Of The World?
- Why Is Cinema Just Like My Mother?
- Can Cinema Teach Us How to Pay Attention? — What Playtime, Ikiru & After Hours Asks Of Us
- When Does A Film Become Camp?
- Why Black Girl Still Matters 60 Years Later w/ Djeneba Saccoh
- The Watermelon Woman at 30: Cheryl Dunye’s Queer Cinema Landmark
- Autobiographical Cinema: Why We Love to Film Ourselves
- Wim Wenders Says Cinema Isn’t Political. These Films Disagree.
- 2000 Metres To Andriivka And Why We Need Documentary Films
- Christmas Movies: What Makes a Film Festive?
- How Sex And The City Maps The Rise And Fall Of The American Empire
- Chick Flicks: Can the Genre Come Back?
- Agnès Varda: Why She’s a Cinema Icon
- Morgan Knibbe on The Garden of Earthly Delights and the Silence Around It
- Akira Kurosawa: What He Taught Us About Movies & Morality
- Hiroshima Mon Amour: How Do You Film the Atomic Bomb?
- De Propagandist: Dutch History’s Most Controversial Filmmaker (Luuk Bouwman)
- Bong Joon-ho’s Bloody Brilliance and the Rise of Korean Cinema
- Jeroen Houben on Torch Song (2025)
Meet the other hosts
About the show →
Laura Gommans is a film journalist and the host of Celebrating Cinema.
Hugo Emmerzael is an Amsterdam-based film critic, public speaker and curator with over a decade of experience at the intersection of cinema, music and culture at large.
Tom Ooms is Head of Cinema at LAB111, where he leads the programming, and runs its sister distribution company Odyssey Classics, releasing classic cinema.