Ash is Purest White (2018)
★★★★★
The exquisite Ash Is Purest White by Jia Zhang Ke, starring Tao Zhao in an extraordinary performance, follows the lives of its characters against the background of a rapidly transforming China.
Japan
Maborosi (1995)
★★★★☆
Following Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Cannes Palme d’Or winner and Oscar-nominated Shoplifters, UK audiences now get a chance to see the director’s earlier work Maborosi for the first time.
Shoplifters (2018)
★★★★★
Worthy Cannes Palme d’Or winner Shoplifters, directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda, is a wonderfully human film about families and making choices that continually misleads and intrigues.
Cannes Film Festival 2018: Day 7
★★★★☆
Cannes Film Festival 2018
Cannes Film Festival 2018: Day 6
★★★★☆
Cannes Film Festival 2018
The Third Murder (2017)
★★★★☆
The Third Murder by Hirokazu Koreeda is a totally absorbing philosophical exploration of the nature of truth and freedom and whether they can exist, the difference between the law and justice, and whether anything differentiates murder and the death penalty.
Mountains May Depart (2015)
★★★★☆
Jia Zhang Ke’s Mountains May Depart is an epic vision of decades of change in China, its people and diaspora, with a compelling central character.
London East Asia Film Festival: Before We Vanish (2017)
★★★★☆
Before We Vanish by Kiyoshi Kurosawa is a genre-bending Japanese bodysnatchers movie that provokes an alien apocalypse on Earth.
Your Name (2016)
In Makoto Shinkai’s haunting Japanese anime, two teenagers swap bodies and lives.
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Cannes review: Before We Vanish (2017)
★★★★☆
Before We Vanish by Kiyoshi Kurosaw is a genre-bending Japanese bodysnatchers movie that provokes an alien apocalypse on Earth.
Harmonium (2016)
★★★★★☆
In Koji Fukada’s Harmonium, the fragile harmony of a Japanese family is shattered by the arrival of a mysterious stranger.
A Silent Voice (2016)
★★★★☆
A Silent Voice is an unusual and sensitive anime about deafness and teen bullying based on the long-running manga by Yoshitoki Oima.
Mr Long (2017)
★★☆☆☆
Rehabilitating the hitman with Japanese kindness, Sabu’s Mr Long flickers between moments of splendour, kitsch and sentimentality.
Your Name (2016)
In Makoto Shinkai’s haunting Japanese anime, two teenagers swap bodies and lives.
Read More