Journey to the Shore
Description
The ghost of a long-absent husband returns home to take his wife on a trip across Japan in this wistful supernatural drama from the Japanese master of dread, Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Cure, SFIFF 1997; Doppelganger, SFIFF 2003). Reuniting after many years with the long-time face of Japanese indie film, Tadanobu Asano (who starred in his 2003 youth ennui epic, Bright Future), Kurosawa brings a more mature, becalmed feel to this look at individuals caught in limbo, unable to move forward after tragedy. Shuffling through her gray days years after her husband Yusuke (Asano) has gone missing, young piano teacher Mizuki (Eri Fukatsu) barely bats an eye when he suddenly reappears in her apartment one night, dripping wet, and explains that he drowned years ago in an accident. The next day, they begin a journey across Japan, to visit the people that the husband befriended on his return, individuals haunted by their own sense of grief and loss, and also by their own ghosts. A moving and melancholy trek across a land of phantoms and sorrow, Journey to the Shore benefits from Kurosawa’s masterful staging, where nightmares are never far from reality, and the mundane and supernatural co-exist within each frame. —Jason Sanders
Born in Kobe, Japan, Kiyoshi Kurosawa started his filmmaking career in Japan’s prolific direct-to-video scene of the early and mid-1980s, churning out multiple soft-core “pink films” and low-budget yakuza works. He achieved critical acclaim and international notoriety with more polished, supernaturally tinged films like Cure (SFIFF 1997), Charisma (SFIFF 1999) and Doppelganger (SFIFF 2003), many starring his frequent collaborator Kôji Yakusho. With Tokyo Sonata (2008), he turned his attention to the family drama, with great success.
Trailer
//player.vimeo.com/video/158107755?autoplay=1Film Details
Language Japanese
Year 2015
Runtime 128
Country Japan/France
Director Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Producer Hiroshi Endo, Masa Sawada, Hiroko Matsuda, Takehiko Aoki
Writer Takashi Ujita, Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Editor Tsuyoshi Imai
Cinematographer Akiko Ashizawa
Music Yoshihide Otomo, Naoko Eto
Cast Eri Fukatsu, Tadanobu Asano, Masao Komatsu