A pleasant Rocky-like dance-narrative, yet Nakamoto struggles to develop his promising concept into an emotionally satisfying experience.
Category: Violence
Night Flower (2025) review [Nippon Connection 2026]
Eiji Uchida delivers a highly moving drama of motherhood.
SAI: Disaster (2025) review [Nippon Connection 2026]
Yutaro Seki and Kentaro Hirase deliver an experience that, in our view, has everything to become a cult-phenomenon, so do not sleep on it.
Fantasia International Film Fest: Japanese Films not to miss.
Find out our recommendations of this year’s Fantasia Film Festival.
All About Lily Chou-Chou (2001) review-analysis
A modern classic, one of the best, if not the best, cinematic experiences of the ‘00.
Mag Mag (2025) review [Nippon Connection 2026]
Yuriyan Retriever delivers a satisfying film of subjective growth, yet not without a highly ironic aftertaste.
Anymart (2026) review [Nippon Connection 2026]
A darkly twisted comical horror narrative that exposes the dynamic of repressive societal violence and what the Japanese societal field seeks to refuse.
The Blood Of Rebirth (2009) review
Toyoda transforms the folkloric tale of Oguri Hangan into a personal warning for the Other: I will not let you ‘kill’ my societal position as director.
Sana: Let Me Hear (2024) review
Dramatic, thrilling, chilling, shockingly good.
Sana (2023) review
Takashi Shimizu cannot avoid his film from being held back from the fan-service it needs to deliver.
Suzuki=Bakudan (2025) review
A thrilling ride that brutally confronts the spectator with the effects of the over-emphasis of pleasure and consumption within social interactions on the subject
Chasuke’s Journey (2015)
Sabu leverages the familiar frame of the encounter to offer a fresh and deeply satisfying experienc
A Strange House (2024) review
Uketsu, your work deserves better.
Party 7 (2000) review
Ishii elevates the staging of the truth of the phallus with many moments of refined interactional absurdity and a finale that, in an inimitable fashion, exposes lack and castration.
Re/Member: The Last Night (2025) review
A fun romp if one takes everything at face-value