A Girl Missing director Kôji Fukada seated in front of posters for James Crump’s Antonio Lopez 1970: Sex Fashion & Disco and Atsuko Hirayanagi’s Oh Lucy! at Film Movement Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Kôji Fukada’s A Girl Missing (Yokogao), shot by Ken'ichi Negishi (Akihiro Toda’s Neko Ni Mikan), stars Mariko Tsutsui with Mikako Ichikawa, Miyu Ogawa, Mitsuru Fukikoshi, Sôsuke Ikematsu, and Ren Sudo. Fukada’s Harmonium won the Cannes Un Certain Regard Jury Prize in 2016 and he is also the director of The Man From The Sea and Au Revoir L’Été. At Film Movement in New York I spoke with Kôji about his love of Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window, how some say his heroine resembles Golden Globe winner Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker in Todd Phillips’ movie, unravelling societal conventions, and what he did to create the sound design in post-production.
Motoko (Mikako Ichikawa) with Ichiko (Mariko...
Kôji Fukada’s A Girl Missing (Yokogao), shot by Ken'ichi Negishi (Akihiro Toda’s Neko Ni Mikan), stars Mariko Tsutsui with Mikako Ichikawa, Miyu Ogawa, Mitsuru Fukikoshi, Sôsuke Ikematsu, and Ren Sudo. Fukada’s Harmonium won the Cannes Un Certain Regard Jury Prize in 2016 and he is also the director of The Man From The Sea and Au Revoir L’Été. At Film Movement in New York I spoke with Kôji about his love of Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window, how some say his heroine resembles Golden Globe winner Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker in Todd Phillips’ movie, unravelling societal conventions, and what he did to create the sound design in post-production.
Motoko (Mikako Ichikawa) with Ichiko (Mariko...
- 1/6/2020
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Koji Fukada’s tale of a dull domestic routine disturbed builds to a bleak, stunning conclusion
In this dark Japanese drama, Akie (Mariko Tsutsui) and her husband, Toshio (Kanji Furutachi), lead a dull suburban existence that revolves around their precocious young daughter, Hotaru (Momone Shinokawa). When Toshio’s old friend Yasaka (Tadanobu Asano) turns up one day hoping for work and board, all slick white shirt and self-possessed flirtatious energy, their drudgery is disrupted. Toshio obliges, unable to refuse for reasons revealed later, setting a life-altering chain of events in motion, the tension ratcheted up with the help of harmonium-playing Hotaru’s clacking metronome.
At the centre of the film is a trio of characters whose contrasting personalities rub up against each other in interesting ways; tensions arise between the carnal Yasaka, repressed housewife Akie and Toshio’s weak, withholding masculinity. Tsutsui’s tightly coiled performance is particularly compelling, a fury burning beneath her wearied,...
In this dark Japanese drama, Akie (Mariko Tsutsui) and her husband, Toshio (Kanji Furutachi), lead a dull suburban existence that revolves around their precocious young daughter, Hotaru (Momone Shinokawa). When Toshio’s old friend Yasaka (Tadanobu Asano) turns up one day hoping for work and board, all slick white shirt and self-possessed flirtatious energy, their drudgery is disrupted. Toshio obliges, unable to refuse for reasons revealed later, setting a life-altering chain of events in motion, the tension ratcheted up with the help of harmonium-playing Hotaru’s clacking metronome.
At the centre of the film is a trio of characters whose contrasting personalities rub up against each other in interesting ways; tensions arise between the carnal Yasaka, repressed housewife Akie and Toshio’s weak, withholding masculinity. Tsutsui’s tightly coiled performance is particularly compelling, a fury burning beneath her wearied,...
- 5/7/2017
- by Simran Hans
- The Guardian - Film News
A seemingly regular family gets an unexpected visitor
The Suzuokas are a seemingly regular family of three, living in the suburbs. The husband, Toshio, runs a small metalworking industry in the basement of the house they live in. His wife, Fumie is a homemaker and their little daughter, Hotaru goes to the elementary school and takes harmonium lessons.
However, when Kusataro Yasaka, an old acquaintance of Kanji arrives unexpectedly to their house, after he is released from prison, everything changes. Kanji seems to have a past life that Mariko did not know of, and a secret he shares with Kusataro that makes him invite him to stay at their house. Mariko is infuriated in the beginning, but as time passes and Kusataro reveals the reasons he went to prison, he takes a liking to him. The same applies to Hotaru, as Kusataro also knows how to play the harmonium and begins teaching her.
The Suzuokas are a seemingly regular family of three, living in the suburbs. The husband, Toshio, runs a small metalworking industry in the basement of the house they live in. His wife, Fumie is a homemaker and their little daughter, Hotaru goes to the elementary school and takes harmonium lessons.
However, when Kusataro Yasaka, an old acquaintance of Kanji arrives unexpectedly to their house, after he is released from prison, everything changes. Kanji seems to have a past life that Mariko did not know of, and a secret he shares with Kusataro that makes him invite him to stay at their house. Mariko is infuriated in the beginning, but as time passes and Kusataro reveals the reasons he went to prison, he takes a liking to him. The same applies to Hotaru, as Kusataro also knows how to play the harmonium and begins teaching her.
- 10/27/2016
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
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