Experimental filmmaker Nobuhiko Ōbayashi was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer in 2016. His team of doctors feared the director had only three months to live.

Ōbayashi defied the odds (although he was very ill) and made two more films before his death (three years after his diagnosis), 2017’s “Hanagatami” and this year’s “Labyrinth of Cinema” which was completed in 2019.