Jun Ichikawa Movies

Recalling both Yasujiro Ozu and Eric Rohmer, Jun Ichikawa directs this quiet, understated tale about one woman's attempts at braving the rapids of romance. Following a breakup with her boyfriend, Eriko (Rena Tanaka) feels like her life is adrift. In the film's outset, Eriko is meandering from one trendy corner or Tokyo to another with little ability to connect with her surroundings. In spite of her new job at a foreign car dealership or conversations with her vivacious mother (Kirin Kiki) -- who not only sculpts but makes a killer bowl of noodles -- Eriko can't escape the feeling of a yawning gap in her life. Then one day, she meets a rumpled salaryman named Tamura (Yukiyoshi Ozawa) and she's hooked. Yet when they go out later on a date, he tells her that his longtime girlfriend is studying in the States. In spite of this, their mutual attraction remains and soon Eriko makes a rash offer to Tamura -- that he move in with her until his girlfriend returns. He agrees and for a while Eriko is utterly happy. But when some of the charm of this would-be Mr. Right wears off, Eriko seems him in a much more negative light. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

With an eye to Yasujiro Ozu's masterpiece Tokyo Story (1953), director Jun Ichikawa creates this drama about a dysfunctional family. Fourteen-year-old Shimotsuki, like most Japanese students her age, is struggling through studying for high school entrance exams -- until her world is shattered when her parents, who try to maintain a living as the failing comedy duo Harumi and Ryusuke, suddenly divorce after her father has a child by another woman. For a while, her parents still try to maintain the comedy until her deadbeat father disappears, devastating her mother. Shimotsuki decides that enough is enough and goes to look for Dad. Ichikawa is interested not only in creating a compelling narrative but also in bringing out Osaka's unique culture. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

Following up on his 1995 Ozu-like work Tokyo Kyodai with this restrained look at lost love, Ichikawa centers his film on Hamanaka (Kyozo Nagatsuka), a middle-aged native of Tokyo's old shitamachi district who returns to his job and his wife after years of meandering about the country. Soon he is establishing a rapprochement with his jilted wife (Mitsuko Baisho) and revamps his father's dusty appliance store into a shop that specializes in computer games. In spite of righting the wrongs in his life, Hamanaka is still unhappy. In what has become neighbor lore, Hamanaka was, in his youth, desperately in love with Tami (Kaori Momoi) who managed the coffee shop across the street from his store. When she dumped him for another man, Hamanaka tried to soldier on and have a normal adult life, which included marrying his current wife. Evidentially the strain proved so much that he bolted for the hills. Years later, Tami is still at the same coffee shop and Hamanaka is, in spite of himself, still in love with her. To make matters even more painful, she seems to still hold feelings for him. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

Jun Ichikawa spins this family drama reminiscent of the works of Yasujiro Ozu. The film centers on a brother and sister who live in their family's traditional Japanese house long after both of their parents have died. Kenichi (Naoto Ogata), who is in his twenties, works in a used bookstore while his sister, Yoko (Urara Awata), who has just finished up high school, dutifully takes care of the house. Since his parents are dead, Kenichi is serious about looking after his underaged sister. He even spurns his girlfriend -- another clerk at the same bookstore -- because she wants to get married before Yoko comes of age. On Yoko's end, she longs to break out and be free. One day, she brings home a bumptious freelance photographer (Toru Tezuka) whose crude ways do not impress the conservative Kenichi. In spite of this -- of perhaps because of this -- Yoko beds him and soon is spending more and more time with the lad. With his orderly life coming apart at the seams, will Kenichi be able to get his sister back? ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

Noted filmmaker Jun Ichikawa directs this elegiac semi-documentary look at cancer and death. The film focuses on five terminal cancer patients, all of whom are being treated in the same hospital by the same doctor (Ittoku Kishibe). Filmed with a fractured, episodic structure, Byoin quietly depicts the movie's characters as they try to make sense of their waning existences. At one point an elderly couple, both dying from cancer, see each other for the last time. In another, a middle-aged salaryman demands that his doctor tell him honestly whether or not he has cancer. True to common practice, the doctor prefers to keep his patient in the dark about his condition. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

Directors Toshio Terada, Jun Ichikawa, and Kaori Momoi spin this omnibus film about that cornerstone of Japanese society -- the goaisatsu. Long, stilted, and often painfully maudlin speeches delivered in the floral style of formal Japanese, the goaisatsu graces such public events as wedding receptions, going-away parties, and high school reunions. The first section, directed by Terada and entitled "Iroiro Arimashite," opens at a going-away party for a young worker who has decided to leave her job to marry. During her speech, she makes the off-handed remark that "various things have happened" ("iroiro arimashite"). This aside sends the upper management into a fit of anxiety -- what did she mean? Was she sexually harassed? Was she harboring some awful company secret? They assign her former boss (Keizo Kanie) to get to the bottom of the matter. His investigation lands him in the heart of workplace darkness where office intrigue, petty rivalries, and half-hidden desires are the norm. As he sinks deeper into this corporate quagmire of the soul, his wife complains of neglect and his bosses grow impatient for a report. The second segment, helmed by Ichikawa and titled "Kayo," tells of a lonely middle-aged woman (Mamako Yoneyama) who works at a train station newspaper stand. She wakes at the crack of dawn in her dingy claustrophobic apartment, works long tedious hours making change and stocking her wares, and then returns home by train. When she attends the wedding of her co-worker, she makes a quiet though moving goaisatsu. The final segment, directed by and starring Kaori Momoi, is about a thirtyish unmarried woman who makes a drunken, though heartfelt speech at her high school reunion. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi