Director: Hirokazu Koreeda

Stars: Soya Kurokawa, Sakura Ando, Eita Nagayama, Yuko Tanaka

Director Koreeda returns to his native Japan after five years for this typically affecting if distractingly complex ‘Rashomon’-style triptych scripted by Sakamoto Yuji. It begins with an eleven-year-old boy Minato (Soya) observing a fire at a hostess bar from the window of the apartment block where he lives with his single mum Saori (Sakura), a scene the film loops back to later. Minato is having problems at his school meaning mum Saori must go and speak to the school heads. An earlier incident with an eccentric teacher Mr Hori (Nagayama) is cited as a possible reason for his deteriorating behaviour. Later the film relates Minato’s confusingly close relationship with fellow pupil Yori (Hiragi). Koreeda continues to impress as a director of children as he explores notions of fitting-in, bullying and socialisation, but the time-juggling, non-linear script, assembled like a mystery puzzle, replete with blind alleys and misdirections, works against rather than for the drama. Koreeda’s trademark gentle humanism, soundtracked to a wistful score by the late great Ryuichi Sakamoto, has won out by the stirring third act, but the picture chooses a long and circuitous road to get there.

David Willoughby

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