"Japanese film-maker Koji Fukada has created a film of great lucidity and calm, a walking-pace drama set in the quiet town of Nagi in the south of the country; this is a provincial place of seclusion and restraint, notable for its military base but also an interesting contemporary art gallery. The movie is less overtly sensational and emotional than Fukada's previous pictures such as Love Life or Goodbye Summer, though it has the same Rohmeresque gentleness, the same considerate and caring mien, the same palate-cleansing wash of cool daylight."
"At the centre of the film is an enigma: Yoriko (Takako Matsu) is a single woman who runs a dairy farm in Nagi, but her real passion is art. She draws and sculpts, but entirely for her own pleasure. None of her pieces get exhibited or sold. One warm spring day the movie is elegantly interspersed with chapter-heading closeups in which different kinds of calendar get the days torn off"
"Yoriko is visited by her good friend Yuri (Shizuka Ishibashi), an architect who after some time in Tokyo, moved to Taiwan to start a practice there with her husband Masato but returned to Japan after her divorce. What makes their friendship interesting is that they are sisters-in-law, or perhaps ex-sisters-in-law. Masato is Yoriko's brother. So how exactly has their friendship survived and thrived for so long?"
"Yoriko happens also to be friendly with a local widower, Yoshikuro (Ken'ichi Matsuyama) with whose wife Yoriko was once in love. Yoshikuro's teen son Hatsuko (Kawaguchi Waku) and his friend Keita (Kiyora Fujiwara) come around to Yoriko's farm quite a bit and get a motherly welcome there; Hatsuko in fact recognises Yuri from a line drawing that Yoriko once made of her which his dad now has up in his bedroom."
A walking-pace drama set in the quiet town of Nagi follows Yoriko, a single woman who runs a dairy farm while pursuing art privately through drawing and sculpting. Her works are never exhibited or sold, and the film uses calm daylight and gentle pacing to suggest passion beneath ordinary life. Yoriko’s friend Yuri, an architect who returned to Japan after divorce, forms a long-lasting bond with Yoriko despite complicated family ties. Masato is Yoriko’s brother, making Yuri a sister-in-law or ex-sister-in-law. Yoriko is also friendly with widower Yoshikuro, whose wife Yoriko once loved. Yoshikuro’s teen son and his friend visit Yoriko’s farm, where they receive a motherly welcome, and the story builds around recognition, memory, and unacknowledged love.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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