A meditative experience that plunges the spectator into the ambiguous field of emotional experience with poetic elegance.
Category: Japannual
Oscillation (2026) review [Japannual 2026]
A simple minimalistic body-horror that puts the contemporary frailty of social bonds into question.
Echoes of Motherhood (2025) [Japannual 2026]
A brilliant cinematic experience, a wonderful drama that stirs the heart of the spectator by approaching the dimension of loss, the dynamic of memory, and Otherness in a very poetic way.
The Busiest Actor On Earth (2026) [Japannual 2026]
A filmic experience that is not only full of Kanji Tsuda, but also full of surprises.
Burn (2026) review [Japannual 2026]
Makoto Nagahisa leverages the evocative power of visuals and sounds to plunge the spectator into a subjective experience of subjects who only appear as silenced within the media, with the expulsed human ‘trash’ produced by the contemporary societal Other.
The Gesuidouz (2024) review [Japannual 2025]
While the concatenation of deadpan comical moments succeeds in charming audiences, Ugana’s narrative falls flat in the last half-hour.
The Harbor lights (2025) review [Japannual 2025]
The beauty of Harbor Lights lies in its ability to invite the spectator to think through the dynamic of inter-generational trauma – the dimension of loss – and the destabilizing effect of (structural) discrimination long after the credits have faded.
The Invisible Half (2025) review [Japannual 2025]
Masaki Nishiyama’s message resounds clearly: embrace your Otherness, despite all the societal hammers seeking to hammer you, the nail that sticks out, down.
Baka’s identity (2025) review [Japannual 2025]
Koto Nagata offers the spectator a saddening but entertaining portrait of what the Japanese Other does not want anyone to see: the unsavoury marriage between crime and capitalism
Strangers in Kyoto (2025) review [Japannual 2025]
A light-hearted exploration of uncomfortable truths that marks our interactions with others/the Other – what we say is not what we mean; what we want to say we are not allowed to say; politeness is often a fabricated facade that we must believe in.
A Bad Summer (2025) review [Japannual 2025]
Hideo Jojo offers a compelling exploration of poverty within the Japanese societal field as well as the the structural possibility of exploiting the welfare system for one’s own gain.
Ghost Killer (2025) review [Japannual 2025]
Sonomura’s narrative does little to re-invent the genre, but delivers everything one’s desires in such narratives in spades – a crowd-pleaser, indeed.
New Group (2025) review [Japannual 2025]
Yuta Shimotsu delivers a narrative that, in all probability. will be called the first true J-horror classic of the current decade.
Sin And Evil (2024) review [Japannual 2024]
Saito shows that the Other always bears some responsibility for the subjective outcomes of dysfunctional familial dynamics and the criminal excesses that plague its mendacious image of peaceful harmony.
Desert of Namibia (2024) review [Japannual 2024]
Yoko Yamanaka delivers a cinematic masterpiece of subjectivity.