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Normal Tickets
2:30pm • Saturday, Jun 20, 2026
Grave of the Fireflies: Bleak Week
Presented in partnership with the American Cinematheque, ‘Bleak Week: Cinema of Despair’ is an annual film festival showcasing some of the greatest works of cinema from across the globe that venture into the darkest sides of humanity and the bleakest points in human history.
The fifth annual edition in June 2026 expands to nearly 100 theaters across the U.S., Canada,U.K. and South and Central America, with each venue presenting its own original curated lineup of uncompromising films defined by unpleasant truths and raw empathy. The Park Theatre is delighted and honoured to take part in this monumental series, and sought selections from local filmmakers and friends of the venue when creating the series.
GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES Selected by Park Theatre Staff
Studio Ghibli co-founder Isao Takahata's poignant animated drama GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES is a devastating meditation on the human cost of war, a tale of survival as heartbreaking as it is true to life. Based on the re-tellings of survivor Nosaka Akiyuki, the film has been universally hailed as an artistic and emotional tour de force that is both beautiful, yet at times brutal and horrifying. Now digitally remastered and restored, it is one of the rare films that truly deserves to be called a masterpiece
As the Empire of the Sun crumbles upon itself and a rain of firebombs falls upon Japan, the final death march of a nation is echoed in millions of smaller tragedies. This is the story of Seita (Tsutomu Tatsumi) and his younger sister Setsuko (Ayano Shiraishi), two children born at the wrong time, in the wrong place, and now cast adrift in a world that lacks not the care to shelter them, but simply the resources. Forced to fend for themselves in the aftermath of fires that swept entire cities from the face of the earth, their doomed struggle is both a tribute to the human spirit and the stuff of nightmares. Against all odds, the orphaned siblings must rely completely on each other and struggle to stay together and alive.
"GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES is an emotional experience so powerful that it forces a rethinking of animation... This film proves, if it needs proving, that animation produces emotional effects not by reproducing reality, but by heightening and simplifying it, so that many of the sequences are about ideas, not experiences. It belongs on any list of the greatest war films ever made." (Roger Ebert)
Saturday, June 20
Doors 2:00 pm | Movie 2:30 pm *Start time subject to change. Please arrive on time.
Bleak Week Pass Here: https://tickets.theparktheatre.ca/events/41863-bleak-week-pass
GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES "Hotaru no Haka" (Isao Takahata, 1988 / 90 mins / PG / Japanese with English subs) In the latter part of World War II, a boy and his sister, orphaned when their mother is killed in the firebombing of Tokyo, are left to survive on their own in what remains of civilian life in Japan. The plot follows this boy and his sister as they do their best to survive in the Japanese countryside, battling hunger, prejudice, and pride in their own quiet, personal battle.
