Himizu

The new film from Sion Sono (Love Exposure, Cold Fish) Himizu tells the powerful story of two teenagers’ struggle to live in dystopian future Japan destroyed by a natural disaster.

Keiko (Fumi Nikaido) is a fourteen year old girl obsessed with Yuichi (Shota Sometani, Isn’t Anyone Alive?), in fact, she is self admittedly his stalker. She collects his words and wallpapers her room with them, repeating them like a prayer and getting overexcited at spending any time with him. Yuichi is going through troubling times, his mother has left, leaving him to run the family business and his drunken father has run up debts with the yakuza which he must repay.

When young Yuichi is pushed too far, he embarks on a violent campaign of revenge against society’s evil doers and it’s up to Keiko to try to bring him back to the path of a decent man.

A heart-rending drama and powerful love story, Himizu features startling performances from its young leads who became the first Japanese actors to win the Marcello Mastroianni Award at the 68th Venice Film Festival.

Won the Marcello Mastroianni Award at Venice Film Festival, 2011