Tokyo Sonata

Japan, 2008, 119 Minute Running Time
Genre/Subjects: Drama, Family Issues, Foreign, Social Issues
Language: Japanese English Sub-Titles

MUST END Thursday, August 6
35mm presentation - This Cannes Festival prize-winner is a gripping portrait of a seemingly ordinary Japanese family and its disintegration when the father abruptly loses his job. Unable to face reality, he hides it from his wife and two sons, pretending to go to work daily. The elder son, a tall slacker, drifts aimlessly until he decides to enlist in the military; the younger son, a bright misfit at school, takes piano lessons in secret after his father forbids it. The mother, a traditional Japanese wife and the warm heart of the family, attempts to hold the family together but fails. Director/co-writer Kiyoshi Kurosawa, known for thriller and suspense movies like Cure and Kairo (Pulse), probes the dark side of human nature and the social problems that confront contemporary Japan. His use of light and dark to express a sense of simultaneous hope and horror verges on awe-inspiring, and the ending will leave you enthralled.

DIRECTOR: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Principal Cast: Teruyuki Kagawa, Kyôko Koizumi, Yû Koyanagi, Inowaki Kai, Haruka Igawa, Kanji Tsuda, Kazuya Kojima, Kôji Yakusho
US Distributor: Regent Releasing

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