Tag: 2019 Reviews

Review: Rent a Friend

The Japanese rent-a-friend industry is booming. For a fee, you can hire a BFF, a father, mother, or even long-term partner. There are reports of children who have grown up not knowing that their rent-a-daddy is not the real deal.

In an increasingly interconnected world, where we share our lives through highly visible social media, it makes sense that the pressure to have an active social life has resulted in this kind of service. Writer/director Mayu Akiyama explores this phenomena in her appropriately titled debut feature RENT A FRIEND (月極オトコトモダチ).

Web magazine editor Nasa Mochizuki (Eri Tokunaga) believes, like Billy Crystal in When Harry Met Sally, that a platonic relationship between the genders is impossible. She becomes intrigued with rentable friend Sota’s (Atsushi Hashimoto) notion of the ‘friendship-romance switch’ and secretly tests the limits of that relationship. Yet as Nasa’s singing roommate becomes attracted to Sota, a bizarre love triangle forms.

Given the specifically Japanese spin on the paid ‘friend experience’, there was a wealth of material to play with here. What instantly sets this apart from similarly themed outings is that the female perspective is evident from the start, opening as it does with Nasa yelling a list of romantic grievances into the sea. Slickly avoiding many of the rom-com/rom-dram tropes, an engaging and quirky first act promises a unique take.

Yet even though the film has a tidy runtime of only 78 minutes, it suddenly seems to run out of steam somewhere in the second act and never fully recovers. It’s almost as if the film suddenly has all the joy sucked out of it. Part of the blame lies in what is ironically the film’s greatest strength: it’s unrelenting attempt to explore whether it is possible to “surpass feelings of love.”

The two central performances are terrific. Eri Tokunaga, notable for Kyoto Elegy and her award-winning performance in Haru’s Journey, treads a complex line between journalist curiosity, romantic integrity and tangible yearning. Atsushi Hashimoto’s (Feel the Wind) emotionally removed character is a little harder to get a bead on, but this is perfectly in keeping with the nature of the professional role. Neither actor lets their performance slip away from the truth of these characterisations.

Nor does Akiyama’s screenplay, with the film staying true to itself right up until the final moments. Here guards are finally let down and the film just kind of finishes, which is either perfectly in keeping with the anti rom-com tone of the film – or maybe it’s just anti-climactic.

2018 | Japan | DIR: Mayu Akiyama| WRITERS: Mayu Akiyama | CAST: Eri Tokunaga, Atsushi Hashimoto, Sumire Ashina | DISTRIBUTOR: Spotted Productions (JPN), Japanese Film Festival 2019 (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 78 minutes | RELEASE DATE: October – December 2019 (JFF)

November 10, 2019
Review: A Banana? At This Time of Night?

I admit it: I have been obsessed with this title ever since I saw the poster on AsianWiki in October last year. It might have been the bright yellow of the titular fruit, or maybe the sheer comical exuberance of Yo Oizumi’s expression, but this leapt to the top of my must-sees in 2019.

A BANANA? AT THIS TIME OF NIGHT? (こんな夜更けにバナナかよ　愛しき実話) is actually based on a true story, one that was adapted to Kazufumi Watanabe’s bestselling novel. Medical student Hisashi (Haruma Miura) develops a friendship with Yasuaki Kano (Yo Izumi), a man who has suffered with muscular dystrophy since he was 12 years old. With an army of volunteers at his beck and call, he is a staunch advocate for living “independently” and dreams of moving to America.

The title comes from an unreasonable request Yasuaki makes one evening of rookie volunteer Misaki Ando (Mitsuki Takahata), Hisashi’s girlfriend and the object of Yasuaki’s affections. Much of the film follows of a semi-comic series of attempts to win her over, or over-the-top moments in which Yasuaki engages in a rodeo party.

Yet there’s a solid bit of heart at the chewy caramel centre of director Tetsu Maeda (My Departure) and screenwriter Hiroshi Hashimoto’s (Inuyashiki) film. A series of smaller crises remind us of the seriousness of Yasuaki’s condition, including one that ends with him dependent on a respirator to survive. Having to choose between merely surviving and potentially using the use of his voice, he remains committed to his creed. “I won’t die counting holes in the ceiling,” he re-affirms.

Much of this is held together by Yo Izumi as the central figure, mostly finding a balance between playing some of comedic aspects of the character, based on the real-life Shikano Yasuaki, and the more realistic turns. After all, the character is not always a likeable one, and the fact that we actually feel something for his fate by the end of the film is a testament to his performance.

Having said that, the film does consciously manipulate us into an emotional corner on more than one occasion. Even so, as the film’s coda shows us footage of Shikano, who died in 2002 with over 500 volunteers having worked with him during his time, and might just be a reminder to value each day that we get a chance to exercise the freedom of mobility.

2019 | Japan | DIR: Tetsu Maeda | WRITERS: Kazufumi Watanabe (novel), Hiroshi Hashimoto | CAST: Yo Oizumi, Mitsuki Takahata, Haruma Miura | DISTRIBUTOR: Shochiku (JPN), Japanese Film Festival 2019 (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 120 minutes | RELEASE DATE: October – December 2019 (JFF)

November 9, 2019
Review: Doctor Sleep

The adaptation of Stephen King’s 2003 novel Doctor Sleep was always going to be a beast with many heads. For every staunch acolyte of King’s original novel The Shining, there’s an equally vocal fanbase for Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 film, a masterpiece in its own right – even if King has famously rejected it over the years.

Director and screenwriter Mike Flanagan, an accomplished horror filmmaker with one other King film (Gerald’s Game) under his belt, tries to reconcile all three sources in DOCTOR SLEEP. It’s intended to be a sequel to Kubrick’s film, an adaptation of King’s novel which itself is a sequel to the very different source material.

Set in the aftermath of his father’s terror at The Overlook Hotel, young Danny Torrance is still haunted by the ghosts of that encounter. Years later, the adult Dan (Ewan McGregor) has effectively drowned out his ‘shine’ with alcohol. Yet an encounter of a more terrestrial kind convinces him to leave town and start down the road to sobriety. After connecting with a powerful young shiner called Abra (Kyliegh Curran), he soon learns she is being pursued by the True Knot, a cabal of long-lived shine stealers led by Rose the Hat (Rebecca Ferguson).

To Flanagan’s credit, his attempt to achieve a kind of fidelity or authenticity makes this one of the best adaptations of King’s horror work to date. At least for the first two acts. Buoyed by recent success of It and its sequel, Flanagan faithfully follows King’s roadmap across the first two hours of this epic release. While he recasts and recreates key moments of Kubrick’s film, he has also been careful to retain the thematic threads dealing with addiction, grief, and personal ownership of trauma.

For this is the core of DOCTOR SLEEP: the sins of the father revisiting the son and (at least in print) King’s very personal story of overcoming addiction. Recovery is still an important element in Flanagan’s film, and this gives the narrative its emotional core, especially thanks to an excellent performance from Cliff Curtis as Dan’s friend and sponsor Billy. Similarly, the character of Dick Halloran (who had very different fates in The Shining on page and screen) acts as a kind of conscience, cleverly woven back into the film universe as a spirit guide. You may even forget that the excellent Carl Lumbly (TV’s Supergirl) is not the late Scatman Crothers.

In fact, everyone is excellent – especially Ferguson as she shimmies across the scene like a New Age guru/deadly cult leader, punctuated by some moments of necessarily shocking violence. Her crew, including Zahn McClarnon and Emily Alyn Lind, ensure that their arc is grounded and not the jarring dose of the supernatural that a collection of shine vampires could be. Flanagan expertly cuts between this group, Abra, and Dan to build up a mysterious tension that he maintains for much of the movie.

Where the final act falters is in abandoning the catharsis of King’s emotional denouement and most of the original text in favour of pure fanservice. Recreating iconic moments from Kubick’s The Shining, from elevators of blood to creepy twins, one couldn’t help but wonder if we’d wandered back into Ready Player One. It quite literally feels as though we’ve stepped out of one film and into another, as it recasts an important role and does a disservice to both King and Kubrick in one fell swoop.

Even so, DOCTOR SLEEP is an almost flawless adaptation, right up until the moment where it goes off on its own pony ride. For fans of King, there’s a lot of Easter eggs to find in there as well, from the obvious placement of the number ‘19’ to the concept of ka from The Dark Tower mythology. If you like King as much as Kubrick, chances are you’ll dig this on at least some level. You’re a fan. You’ve always been a fan. I ought to know. I’ve always been here.

2019 | US | DIRECTOR: Mike Flanagan | WRITERS: Mike Flanagan (Based on the novel by Stephen King and the film by Stanley Kubrick and Diane Johnson) | CAST: Ewan McGregor, Rebecca Ferguson, Cliff Curtis, Kyliegh Curran, Carl Lumbly | DISTRIBUTOR: Roadshow Films (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 152 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 7 November 2019 (AUS)

November 4, 2019
Review: Terminator: Dark Fate

From the opening scenes, lifted wholesale from 1991’s Terminator 2: Judgement Day, director Tim Miller’s TERMINATOR: DARK FATE wants you to remember the franchise’s past. Well, specific parts of it at least.

Ignoring the sequels created between 2003 and 2015, screenwriters David S. Goyer, Justin Rhodes, and Billy Ray – working from a story co-credited to series progenitor James Cameron – literally blasts the past in the opening sequences and rewrite the franchise history. It’s now 2020 and Grace (Mackenzie Davis), a cybernetically enhanced human from the future, arrives to protect Daniella “Dani” Ramos (Natalia Reyes) from a newly arrived Rev-9 model terminator (Diego Luna).

It’s barely a compliment to say that this is easily the best sequel since T2, as the quality has rapidly declined across the three alternative timeline sequels. The action sequences are about as generic as they come, but they are relentless and comfortably familiar, which is a credo that could easily apply to the whole film. In terms of pure spectacle, there’s several set-pieces – including a highway sequence that reintroduces Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) – that should get the adrenal glands working in all but the most jaded viewers.

Yet it all still feels like a missed opportunity. The events of the opening sequence conclusive hit the reset button on the franchise, giving Miller and his crew a chance to take the film’s own advice and make its own fate. Instead they play it safe with a soft relaunch and what is ostensibly a remake of T2, right down to the “liquid metal” meanie. SkyNet may have been stopped, but the future feels like history repeating.

Even so, it’s great to see two-thirds of the original cast back together again, with Hamilton ultimately reuniting with Arnold Schwarzenegger for the final showdown. Playing a character known simply as Carl, it’s a strange and fun new direction for the ageing actor. You’ve never heard a T-800 discussing drapery before, have you? In fact, there should be a whole Twin Peaks style spin-off dedicated to this version of Arnie’s famous role.

In the end it’s a fun ride that plays with the current political environment, but one that feels entirely inconsequential as soon as you’ve stepped out of the cinema. It’s the third chapter in a story that never needed a sequel, even if the action-loving world is forever grateful for having T2 in our lives. While it sets us up for more films, this is as good a way as any to bring some closure to at least two characters, and it might be best to let sleeping cyborgs lie.

2019 | US | DIRECTOR: Tim Miller | WRITERS: David Goyer, Justin Rhodes, Billy Ray| CAST: Linda Hamilton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mackenzie Davis, Natalia Reyes, Gabriel Luna, Diego Boneta | DISTRIBUTOR: 20th Century Fox (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 128 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 30 October 2019 (AUS)

November 1, 2019
Review: Promare

The thing about PROMARE (プロメア) is that just when you think that it can’t get any crazier, the film bursts through the next thin boundary of common sense and stamps that line into oblivion. In other words, it just might be a Studio Trigger masterpiece.

Describing the plot to a film like this is like trying to catalogue each element of a Jackson Pollock painting, but here goes nothing. It’s been thirty years since the appearance of the Burnish, a group of flame-wielding mutants, destroyed half the world. When an extremist group called Mad Burnish emerges, Galo Thymos – a new recruit in the firefighting Burning Rescue brigade – goes up against Mad Burnish leader Lio Fotia. Yet he may not be the real villain.

From the opening credits, blending a kind of animated ‘documentary’ footage with the Benday dots of retro cartooning, PROMARE visually signals that it is going to be something different. In fact, it would be folly to try and follow this as if it were a traditional narrative, as director Hiroyuki Imaishi and writer Kazuki Nakashima have managed to tap into the collective unconscious of anime fans and given us a continuous train of thought of almost two hours.

Yet for the all of the seemingly chaotic shopfront, Imaishi and Nakashima exhibit a very savvy awareness of the conventions of modern anime. So much so that they use all of them: the tropes, inside jokes, visual parodies, genre transitions (from mecha to mock yaoi in a heatbeat), insane cutaways, and literal deus ex machinas. It’s almost as if they compressed several seasons of a show into a single film or wanted to make every anime at once. Either way it works.

The animation is unquestionably mind-blowing. While it may not be everyone’s cup of tea – pastel explosions, CG buildings, rectangular lens flare, and triangular ash – you never forget that you are watching something different. There’s one breakout sequence where the screen fills with a series of massive Burning constructs, each of them seeming to devour the last. At other times, seemingly random inserts will appear as a means of transitions between scenes. This film cares not for your rules.

In PROMARE we have a strange hybrid that is not only a tip of the hat to all the things the filmmakers love, but a weird tribute to itself as well. Fans of Gurren Lagann and Kill La Kill will recognise all the hallmarks of those shows (albeit turned up to 11), while everybody else can happily walk into this without any warning. The looks on their unsuspecting faces will be worth the price of admission.

2019 | Japan | DIRECTOR: Hiroyuki Imaishi | WRITERS: Kazuki Nakashima | CAST: Kenichi Matsuyama, Taichi Saotome, Masato Sakai, Ayane Sakura, Hiroyuki Yoshino| DISTRIBUTOR: Madman (AUS)| RUNNING TIME: 111 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 24 October 2019 (AUS)

October 31, 2019
Review: Brave Father Online – Our Story of Final Fantasy XIV

There is an enthusiasm around the Final Fantasy video game series that is difficult to fathom outside the world of gamers. Given that it has been running since 1987, BRAVE FATHER ONLINE: OUR STORY OF FINAL FANTASY XIV (劇場版ファイナルファンタジーXIV 光のお父さん) attempts to capture the intergenerational meaning of the game to families with a little bit of clever marketing in the mix too.

Based on a true story, BRAVE FATHER ONLINE adapts the 2017 mini-series Final Fantasy XIV: Dad of Light. Akio (Kentaro Sakaguchi) has struggled with his emotionally distant father Akira (Kotaro Yoshida) since he was a boy. In fact, he finds dealing with other humans through their Final Fantasy avatars much easier. When Akira unexpectedly retires, Akio secretly bonds with him online via the game.

BRAVE FATHER ONLINE is a film quite literally made in two parts, indicated by dual-credited directors Teruo Noguchi and Kiyoshi Yamamoto. While the former deals with the live action segments of the film, the latter creates a kind of movie-within-a-movie using the game engine. Rather than simply being one of those machinima type productions, screenwriter Kota Fukihara often uses the motif to have group therapy sessions that might feel stilted in a real life setting.

The blend of the two worlds is far more effective than one might assume, and the MMO aspect of the game universe allows for several plot threads to integrate over time and distance. Much of this is due to the formidable presence of the Kotaro Yoshida (The Third Murder), who swings between taciturn and disarmingly tender, such as a scene where he visits a stand-up session to reluctantly support his daughter’s fiancé.

If it all feels like a bit of a blatant grab for your hearts and wallets, it’s probably because it is. That doesn’t mean that it’s any less endearing, with several crises and sweet moments carefully timed to remind us of the importance of family and community. If that community happens to come together via Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, then it seems that your life will be all the richer for it.

While it may feel like an extended advertorial for the titular game at times, this is more about finding connections. A charming film that leans heavily into sentiment, and the machinima technique of using the game engine to create dramatic scenes, it all comes together in a sweet (albeit predictable) ending. At least until the next Final Fantasy XVI is released and tears the family apart.

2019 | Japan | DIR: Teruo Noguchi and Kiyoshi Yamamoto | WRITERS: Kota Fukihara | CAST: Kentaro Sakaguchi, Kotaro Yoshida | DISTRIBUTOR: Gaga Corporation (JPN), Japanese Film Festival 2019 (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 114 minutes | RELEASE DATE: October – December 2019 (JFF)

October 27, 2019
Review: Ready or Not

Every now and then a film comes along that just makes you smile. Sometimes it’s a film that speaks to the heart of your human condition. At other times, it’s because it’s gently charming. READY OR NOT is neither of those things, but damn if I didn’t have a grin on my face for most of this throwback splatterfest.

After opening on a violent parlour game in a stately manor, we jump forward 30 years to the pending nuptials of Grace (Samara Weaving) to Daniel Le Domas (Adam Brody), one of the presumptive heirs to the Le Domas gaming dominion. Given a snobbish reception, she soon discovers that it’s tradition to play a random game at midnight to welcome her into the family. Drawing a card labelled “hide and seek,” all hell breaks loose when the bloody reality of the rules becomes apparent.

While it’s hard to shake the feeling that we’ve seen this all before, READY OR NOT delights in shocking us with a series of gory demises once the dangerous game begins. There’s a running gag of maidservants being dispatched perfunctorily, and the repetition doesn’t make it any less funny. Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett find normalcy in the incredulity of the situation, making this a grand bit of gore in the tradition of Evil Dead.

If The Babysitter and Mayhem weren’t proof enough, Samara Weaving was made for this kind of star vehicle. From panicked to kick-ass to being totally over the family’s shit, it’s a perfect vessel to show off her comedy chops and emotional range. Of course, the ghoulishly great family around her sells the historic horror, especially the gleefully grim Nicky Guadagni, who looks set to murder us all with her piercing gazes.

You may walk out of the cinema with the same expression as the lead characters: shellshocked, wearied, and covered in crimson goo. Yet it’s hard to imagine that you haven’t had a ball along the way, inadvertently cheering on every deadly dispatch while wondering how the stakes will next be raised. So kick off your wedding hells, replace them with some comfortable footwear, and settle in for the ride. READY OR NOT has all the hallmarks of a cult classic in the making.

2019 | US | DIRECTOR: Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett | WRITERS: Guy Busick, R. Christopher Murphy| CAST: Samara Weaving, Adam Brody, Mark O’Brien, Henry Czerny, Andie MacDowell | DISTRIBUTOR: 20th Century Fox (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 95 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 25 October 2019 (AUS)

October 27, 2019
Review: Little Nights, Little Love

In just under a decade, the already prolific filmmaker Rikiya Imaizumi has made a mark on the Japanese scene. This year alone, his adaptations of Just Only Love and LITTLE NIGHTS, LITTLE LOVE (アイネクライネナハトムジーク) have been doing the rounds on the local cinema and festival circuits, winning a few hearts along the way.

Based on the book by Kotaro Isaka, the story is a lot more low-key than his cult favourite Fish Story or the suspense thriller Golden Slumber. Drawing from various short stories in Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, the primary narrative centres on market researcher Sato (Haruma Miura). Waiting for a big romantic moment to bring a perfect match into his life, one day he spots the word “shampoo” written on the hand of a survey participant and wonders if that is a fateful sign.

Parallel to Sato’s story is that of hairdresser Minako (Shihori Kanjiya), who laments a similar lack of opportunities. At the urging of a colleague, she spends time talking to the brother of a client, and as they begin to get close she discovers that he is Manabu Ono (Sekigahara’s Eiki Narita), the first Japanese contender for a boxing championship.

The latter becomes one of the recurring motifs of the film, and emblematic of the importance people place on external rituals and events to their own happiness. Several characters resolve to make decisions based on the outcome of Manabu’s matches, for example. Sato’s colleague Fujima (Taizo Harada), who is surprised to find that his wife has just packed up and left, tries to use the wave of national good will towards the boxer to reforge a relationship with his daughter.

Yet director Rikiya Imaizumi is content to explore each of these characters through little vignettes. Some, like the rallying support of a deaf high school kid, shows the various character’s lives intersecting at various points. In this way, it functions as a minor hyperlinked narrative, but only to to demonstrate the commonality amongst the experiences. Singer-songwriter Kazuyoshi Saito’s catchy “Chiisana Yoru” (“Little Nights”), performed on screen by Taichi Kodama as a busker credited as Saito-san, serves as a linking mechanism.

Central performances are key, and delightful turns from Mikako Tabe, Haruma Miura and Erika Mori support the light dramatic touch. Without giving anything away, there is a time jump at one point in the film, and it is interesting to see how each of the actors evolves their character in this time.

The ultimate message around expectation versus reality, and playing the cards that you are dealt, is a refreshing one in a film that is charmingly relatable on many levels. Or as one character aptly puts it, “Don’t diss the cogs.” In fact, the only life challenge this film should leave you with is trying to get that theme song out of your head.

2019 | Japan | DIR: Rikiya Imaizumi | WRITERS: Kenichi Suzuki (based on the short story collection by Kotaro Isaka) | CAST: Haruma Miura, Mikako Tabe, Taizo Harada, Eiki Narita | DISTRIBUTOR: Gaga Corporation (JPN), Japanese Film Festival 2019 (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 119 minutes | RELEASE DATE: October – December 2019 (JFF)

October 26, 2019
Review: Kakegurui

If the popular culture of Japan is any indication, attending a high school is a potential minefield of possibilities. If you aren’t fighting off alien hordes, getting overly enthusiastic about a club or falling in love, then there’s straight-up bullying to deal with.

In KAKEGURUI (映画賭ケグルイ), based on the manga by Homura Kawamoto and Tōru Naomura, going to school is a literal gamble. The prestigious Hyakkaou Private Academy ranks its students by their gambling winnings, and high stakes games even determine their entire life outcomes. School Council President, Kirari Momobami (Elaiza Ikeda) is the Queen Bee of the school, and the only way to restore one’s good graces is by beating her at her own games.

When the deceptively sweet transfer student Yumeko Jabami (Minami Hamabe) arrives, she becomes the first step in a major shake-up of the establishment. Meanwhile, group calling themselves The Village, dressed all in white and led by the charismatic Murasame (Hio Miyazawa), believes that gambling is meaningless and seek to end its practice at Hyakkaou.

Spinning off from the TV series of the same name, my concerns of treading knee-deep into an established set of rules and characters were quickly abated. Despite sharing a cast and a creative team with the 2018-2019 TBS-MBS show, director Tsutomu Hanabusa and co-screenwriter Minato Takano craft a pretty self-contained narrative that only asks you to remember the dozens of characters that they throw at us in the first 15 minutes or so.

It also helps that there are few moments when the film isn’t actually explaining what we are seeing. Like the darker cousin of Chihayafuru, 90% of the dialogue is exposition for what it happening in a particular card game. Even a high-pressure game of rock/paper/scissors comes complete with a running narrative of the tactics and reactions to the surprisingly tense twists that it often takes.

From the extreme camera angles to Michiru’s seemingly Pirates of the Caribbean inspired score, everything in KAKEGURUI is completely and unapologetically over-the-top. Japanese live-action adaptations often attempt this kind of fidelity, recreating reactions and textual styles that should really only work on page or in animation. Haruka Fukuhara as the beleaguered Arukibiju, for example, does an amazing job of delivering this kind of madcap performance.

To the film’s credit, this faithfulness results in a visually exciting piece, albeit a chaotically edited one. Building to an impressively staged battle royale across the school grounds, and an intense game of cards that even James Bond would have trouble keeping up with, this is the kind of fun that is just the right amount of bonkers.

2019 | Japan | DIR: Tsutomu Hanabusa | WRITERS: Minato Takano, Tsutomu Hanabusa | CAST: Minami Hamabe, Mahiro Takasugi, Elaiza Ikeda | DISTRIBUTOR: Japanese Film Festival 2019 (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 119 minutes | RELEASE DATE: October – December 2019 (JFF)

October 22, 2019
Review: Masquerade Hotel

MASQUERADE HOTEL (マスカレード・ホテル) arrives with all the fanfare you’d expect from a film based on the works of a blockbuster writer. Indeed, the screen rights to novelist Keigo Higashino’s most releases, including The Crimes That Bind and Laplace’s Witch, underwent serious bidding battles.

A series of murders across Tokyo lead Detective Kosuke Nitta (Takuya Kimura) to Hotel Koruteshia Tokyo, where he believes the next crime will take place. Working undercover as a concierge, he encounters the super-professional Naomi Yamagishi (Masami Nagasawa) who tries to teach him the value of good customer service.

With the flourish of a CG-enhanced zoom in on Japan from space, there’s a sense that we’re arriving in medias res with this film. This probably has something to do with the fact that this is based on a series of books all all of the characters are firmly established in the creator’s minds. This gives director Masayuki Suzuki (Princess Toyotomi), continuing a theme from 2017’s Honnuji Hotel, confident ground to stand on.

It also means a little bit of controlled chaos in the narrative, with screenwriter Michitaka Okada (the Liar Game series of films) flipping from one subplot to the next. Effectively operating as a “closed room” murder mystery in the vein of Agatha Christie, the odd asides and flashbacks feel more like giant signposts than subtle clues at times.

Yet the cast in universally excellent. Suzuki and actor Takuya Kimura previously worked together on the drama series Hero and subsequent film of the same name, and he slides into an easy leading man role here. It’s Masami Nagasawa (Before We Vanish, Gintama, Your Name) who rightly takes the film by the horns and steers it. Supporting cast includes the likes of the recognisable Fumiyo Kohinata and Zen Kajihara for a rounded gallery of faces.

A slick and crowd-pleasing adaptation, it’s hard to imagine a more perfect opening night film for the Japanese Film Festival 2019. Without giving away the twisty conclusion too much, the film certainly sets itself up for further adventures. With a likeable set of leads and an in-built set of stories that can spin-off from the core, this is the kind of hotel that you’d happily make a return visit to after check-out.

2019 | Japan | DIR: Masayuki Suzuki | WRITERS: Michitaka Okada (based on the novel by Keigo Higashino) | CAST: Takuya Kimura, Masami Nagasawa | DISTRIBUTOR: Japanese Film Festival 2019 (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 132 minutes | RELEASE DATE: October – December 2019 (JFF)

October 22, 2019