Morio Agata Movies
- 2008
A passionate young man gets a crash course in the ways of love in this romantic comedy-drama from Japanese auteur Nami Iguchi. Mirume (Kenichi Matsuyama) is a nineteen-year-old student pursuing a degree in art at a college outside Tokyo. Mirume signs up for a printmaking class, and the handsome young artist makes a major impression on Yuri (Hiromi Nagasaku), an attractive professor in her mid-thirties who is teaching the course. Yuri seduces naïve Mirume, and before long he's convinced that she's the love of his life. When school shuts down for the summer break, Yuri heads north to her home in Kiryu City, and after uncovering her address, Mirume follows her home. Mirume arrives at Yuri's house to discover she has a husband (Morio Agata) who doesn't understand the purpose of Mirume's visit, and as the evening wears on, Mirume becomes increasingly reluctant to accept that Yuri wanted nothing more than a brief fling. Meanwhile, Mirume's infatuation with Yuri doesn't set well with En (Yu Aoi), one of his classmates who is clearly attracted to him. Hito no sekkusu o waruna (aka Don't Laugh At My Romance) was an official selection at the 2008 Hong Kong Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Hiromi Nagasaku, Kenichi Matsuyama, (more)
- 1995
This charming Japanese drama follows the exploits of a Kanako, a dippy young waitress, who promised her old friend "Chestnut Uncle" that when he died, she would have him buried rather than cremated so his body could give something back to the earth from whence he came. Soon after his death, Kanako and her son enlist the aid of a friend with a delivery truck to help them take the body to the wooded knoll where Uncle wanted to be interred. Along the way, she stops at a department store to buy a shovel and somehow ends up playing a keyboard in the music department. Later she must carry Uncle on her back until they reach the hilltop and bury him. Kanako is so happy that she could honor her promise and put Uncle's spirit to rest. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1994
Musician and actor turned filmmaker Morio Agata directs this subtly wrought tale of recrimination and reconciliation, based on a manga written by Oji Suzuki. Seventeen-year-old Minoru (Natsuo Ishido) -- a leather-clad lass with cropped hair who radiates teenaged rebellion -- sets out on her motorcycle to find her father, who abandoned her as baby. With her mother's blessing, she journeys from Tokyo to the northern island of Hokkaido. Along the way, she encounters a series of characters who include an oafish truck driver, a rakish film projectionist, and a weird middle-aged amateur magician. She discovers that her father (played by director Agata) is a successful manga artist with a new wife and family, and the reunion between father and daughter proves to be awkward. Minoru's father tries to make amends but is reluctant to be little more than a friend to her, a role she is not willing to accept. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
- 1986
Inventive director Kaizo Hayashi has skillfully re-created the ambience of silent films of the 1910s and 1920s in this endearing story. All dialogue is not spoken, but captioned in subtitles. An actress called "The Princess" has been kidnapped and it is up to the heroic detective and his trusty, comic assistant to rescue this damsel in distress. Off they go, tracking down leads and sniffing out clues. The city never sleeps and somewhere out there is an older woman watching a silent-era film in which she starred -- no matter that the last reel seems to have been swallowed by time. The plot continues to thicken in this eye-catching and evocative film. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Moe Kamura, Shiro Sano, (more)
