‘Cat Heaven Island’, A Short Film About the Island in Japan Where Cats Outnumber Humans

Cat Heaven Island” by Landon Donoho and Derek Scearce is a short featurette about the island of Tashirojima in Ishinomaki, Miyagi, Japan. Just like Aoshima, Miyazaki in southern Japan, Tashirojima is a place where feral cats and wild crows outnumber the elderly residents of the island by a large margin. The featurette is part of a longer film that Donoho is making about the island, which is currently in post-production.

In early 2014 I was given a fairly sizable budget to shoot my first feature on a small island in Japan. This place was wonderfully unique for it’s cats, its people, and it’s name. Cat Island. The feature is currently in post, but here’s a small featurette till then.

Photographer Christopher Michael Wong accompanied Donoho to Tashirojima and caught amazing images of the feral felines going about their day.

In 2014 I had the pleasure of accompanying Landon Donoho and Derek Scearce on the filming of their documentary on Tashirojima – an island off the Northern Coast of Japan which is home to over eight hundred cats, who war with gangs of crows for control of the island and the plentiful fish caught by the people who live there.

via My Modern Met

Lori Dorn
Lori Dorn

Lori is a Laughing Squid Contributing Editor based in New York City who has been writing blog posts for over a decade. She also enjoys making jewelry, playing guitar, taking photos and mixing craft cocktails.