Grants & Awards

About the Film:

Cutie and the Boxer chronicles the marriage of two Japanese artists, Ushio and Noriko Shinohara, who met in New York City in the late 1960’s and have been living and working there since.  As a young artist in Tokyo, Ushio became famous for his raucous performance art and action painting. He set out for New York City in 1969 seeking international recognition, and after four decades of hard work, he has achieved notoriety but little commercial success.  His wife Noriko, 21 years his junior, moved to New York at age 19 to study art. She soon fell in love with Ushio, moved into his Soho loft, and became pregnant. Abandoning her education, she became the caregiver for her unruly, alcoholic husband and their newborn son.  The film depicts Noriko’s struggle to emerge from the shadow of her over-bearing husband and blossom as an independent artist. Blending archival material and the artists’ illustrations, the film shifts between present-day vérité footage and a stylized version of the past. Through closely observed and candid scenes between the pair, we come to understand that their contrasting, often contentious personalities are the basis for a deep and challenging symbiosis that has kept them together for nearly 40 years.

About the Filmmakers:

Zachary Heinzerling (Director, DP) is a documentary director and cinematographer based in Brooklyn. He most recently was a field producer on the Emmy award-winning HBO documentary series 24/7. He has worked on several projects for HBO, including four Emmy award-winning documentaries, as a Field Producer and DP. Other DP credits include spots for MTV, Pitchfork TV, NY Times, and Esquire Magazine. Patrick Burns (Producer, 2nd Camera) is a journalist and photographer based in New York. He began studying Japanese art and culture while living in Japan, where he became conversant in the language. As a reporter in the New York bureau of the Tokyo Shimbun newspaper, he covered political and cultural events in the U.S. and Latin America. His writing and photographs have appeared in several online and print publications, such as the Huffington Post, the Guardian, and National Geographic. Sierra Pettengill (Producer) has worked in various research and production capacities on many award-winning documentary films. For PBS’s American Experience series, she was the Associate Producer of the Emmy-nominated Walt Whitman, as well as Triangle Fire and Buffalo Bill. Most recently, she was the Associate Producer of HBO’s Wartorn: 1861 – 2010. Lydia Dean Pilcher (Executive Producer) has produced over 27 feature films and is currently preparing to produce The Reluctant Fundamentalist, based on the highly acclaimed novel by Mohsin Hamid, to be directed by Mira Nair. Also headed for production this year is Fela: Music is the Weapon, which she developed at Focus Features with Steve McQueen attached to direct and Chiwetel Ejiofor set to play Fela Kuti. In 2010, Pilcher was nominated for Emmy and Golden Globe Awards for producing HBO Films’ You Don’t Know Jack, directed by Barry Levinson.  Prior to that, Pilcher produced Amelia, starring Hilary Swank as the famous aviatrix Amelia Earhart; The Darjeeling Limited, directed by Wes Anderson; and The Namesake, based on the novel by Jhumpa Lahiri and directed by Mira Nair.