Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy is cinema portmanteau: three short stories focused on three different characters, each a little lovesick and just a little lost. The director is Ryūsuke Hamaguchi, an emerging filmmaker from Japan who seems to have already mastered his craft, and whose work is perfectly at home to such dilemmas. His 2015 film Happy Hour, a five-hour saga, followed the lives of four women in Kobe, one of whom had filed for divorce. Next came Asako I & II in 2018, an adaptation of Tomoka Shibasaki’s novel about a woman who starts seeing a man who looks exactly like the boy she loved when she was younger––a story of doppelgängers, it also showcased his touch for surrealist flourishes.
While fast closing in on auteur status, Hamaguchi’s films continue to hold a kind of literary spirit: Happy Hour the epic; Asako the novella; and now Wheel of Fortune,...
While fast closing in on auteur status, Hamaguchi’s films continue to hold a kind of literary spirit: Happy Hour the epic; Asako the novella; and now Wheel of Fortune,...
- 3/4/2021
- by Rory O'Connor
- The Film Stage
High anticipation for a new Ryūsuke Hamaguchi film is a relatively recent phenomenon. The Japanese director completed his debut film Passion around the tail end of the Bush administration, but it took until the release of Happy Hour, his five-hour opus, in 2015 before he found international acclaim. The director followed that with Asako I & II, a widely admired adaptation of Tomoka Shibasaki’s novel that was selected to compete for the Palme d’Or in 2018.
Premiering in competition this week at the online Berlin Film Festival, his latest is Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy, a thematically intertwined series of three short stories that follows a trio of characters in differing states of longing. As a work of art it is overwhelmingly beautiful, a spiky dialectic on modern love that is as deeply moving as it is expertly crafted and observed–and possibly his finest film yet. On a Zoom...
Premiering in competition this week at the online Berlin Film Festival, his latest is Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy, a thematically intertwined series of three short stories that follows a trio of characters in differing states of longing. As a work of art it is overwhelmingly beautiful, a spiky dialectic on modern love that is as deeply moving as it is expertly crafted and observed–and possibly his finest film yet. On a Zoom...
- 3/3/2021
- by Rory O'Connor
- The Film Stage
Nominated for the Palme D’or in 2018, and based on the novel “Netemo Sametemo” by Tomoka Shibasaki, “Asako I&ii” is an intriguing drama whose narrative shares many similarities with the style of Haruki Murakami novels.
Asako, a 21-year-old woman living in Osaka, meets a strange young man named Baku, and the two fall immediately in-love, essentially becoming a couple from the beginning. Haruyo, Asako’s friend, is against the relationship because she thinks Baku will hurt Asako, and is quite vocal about it, but to no avail. After Asako spends the night in Baku’s house, however, the young man first goes missing for a long time, and after he reappears, he promises his newfound girlfriend, that he will always come back. After that, though, he disappears completely, leaving Asako shattered.
Two years later, Asako lives in Tokyo, working at a cafe, and hanging out with another female friend,...
Asako, a 21-year-old woman living in Osaka, meets a strange young man named Baku, and the two fall immediately in-love, essentially becoming a couple from the beginning. Haruyo, Asako’s friend, is against the relationship because she thinks Baku will hurt Asako, and is quite vocal about it, but to no avail. After Asako spends the night in Baku’s house, however, the young man first goes missing for a long time, and after he reappears, he promises his newfound girlfriend, that he will always come back. After that, though, he disappears completely, leaving Asako shattered.
Two years later, Asako lives in Tokyo, working at a cafe, and hanging out with another female friend,...
- 1/25/2021
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
2019 is nearing the halfway mark, so it’s time to take a look back at the first six months and round up our favorite titles thus far. While the end of this year will bring personal favorites from all of our writers, think of the below 21 entries (and honorable mentions) as a comprehensive rundown of what should be seen before heading into a promising back half of the year.
Do note that this feature is based solely on U.S. theatrical releases from 2019, with many currently widely available on streaming platforms, home video (both noted below) or theatrically. Check them out below, as organized alphabetically, followed by honorable mentions and a handful of films to keep a look out for the rest of the summer.
Amazing Grace (Sydney Pollack)
A time capsule that’s as fresh and powerful an experience as it must have been when recorded live in Watts...
Do note that this feature is based solely on U.S. theatrical releases from 2019, with many currently widely available on streaming platforms, home video (both noted below) or theatrically. Check them out below, as organized alphabetically, followed by honorable mentions and a handful of films to keep a look out for the rest of the summer.
Amazing Grace (Sydney Pollack)
A time capsule that’s as fresh and powerful an experience as it must have been when recorded live in Watts...
- 6/12/2019
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
The New York Film Festival kicks off later this week, launching the second half of a very busy fall festival season. Each year, the New York gathering loads up on the some of the buzziest titles of an awards season in the making, but it also plays home to never-before-seen narratives and new documentaries that go beyond the usual fare. Alongside all those previously-screened features looking to capitalize on strong word-of-mouth coming out of fellow festivals Venice, Telluride, and Toronto — including “The Favourite,” “Roma,” and “If Beale Street Could Talk” — there are a variety of gems worth seeking out at this year’s festival.
Consider this your roadmap to the best of the festival. The 2018 New York Film Festival runs September 28 – October 14, and you check out the main slate right here. Ahead, 10 essential titles — from instant cult classics to highlights from the 2018 circuit and everything in between.
“Asako I & II...
Consider this your roadmap to the best of the festival. The 2018 New York Film Festival runs September 28 – October 14, and you check out the main slate right here. Ahead, 10 essential titles — from instant cult classics to highlights from the 2018 circuit and everything in between.
“Asako I & II...
- 9/25/2018
- by Kate Erbland, Eric Kohn, David Ehrlich, Chris O'Falt, Jude Dry and Michael Nordine
- Indiewire
Considering the esteemed level of curation at the New York Film Festival, which begins this Friday at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, a comprehensive preview could mostly consist of the entire schedule.
There’s the gala slots, Main Slate selections, two films from Film Twitter phenom Hong Sang-soo, and much more, as well as a delectable line-up of restorations.
So rather than single all of these out for our preview, we’re looking at a handful of under-the-radar highlights from across the festival. Check them out below and return for our coverage.
Asako I & II (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi)
Best known for his five-hour drama Happy Hour, Ryûsuke Hamaguchi returned this year with the more palatable Asako I & II, clocking in at a mere 120 minutes. Following its bow in competition at Cannes Film Festival, the film will make its U.S. premiere at the New York Film Festival. Based on Tomoka Shibasaki’s novel,...
There’s the gala slots, Main Slate selections, two films from Film Twitter phenom Hong Sang-soo, and much more, as well as a delectable line-up of restorations.
So rather than single all of these out for our preview, we’re looking at a handful of under-the-radar highlights from across the festival. Check them out below and return for our coverage.
Asako I & II (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi)
Best known for his five-hour drama Happy Hour, Ryûsuke Hamaguchi returned this year with the more palatable Asako I & II, clocking in at a mere 120 minutes. Following its bow in competition at Cannes Film Festival, the film will make its U.S. premiere at the New York Film Festival. Based on Tomoka Shibasaki’s novel,...
- 9/24/2018
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
Los Angeles-based Unified Pictures has obtained the North American rights to the action/comedy Maximum Impact, directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak (Romeo Must Die) from a script by Ross Lamanna (Rush Hour). Starring Alexander Nevsky (Showdown in Manila), Kelly Hu (The Scorpion King), William Baldwin (The Purge: TV series), Tom Arnold (True Lies), Mark Dacascos (John Wick 3: Parabellum) and Danny Trejo (Machete), the pic will get a theatrical release September 28 before rolling out on digital and DVD platforms October 2. The plot: When the granddaughter of the Us Secretary of the State is kidnapped in Moscow, an agent of the Federal Security Service of Russia (Nevsky) and the Us Secret Service are forced to pull aside their differences and work together to prevent a full-scale international crisis. Nevsky produced the pic via his company Hollywood Storm. Steve Break negotiated the deal on behalf of Unified Pictures along with Nevsky on behalf of the filmmakers.
- 8/1/2018
- by Amanda N'Duka
- Deadline Film + TV
Interview: Daniel Kasman | Video: Kurt WalkerDistinctly anomalous in the competition of the Cannes Film Festival this year was Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Asako I & II: in the red carpet sheen of that gala world, its modest production and unshowy demeanor suggested a more appropriate venue in the city might be the Directors’ Fortnight, where the pretense towards grandiosity is less a requirement and subtlety is given the patience to be discovered. Hamaguchi’s film, the director’s follow-up to the much acclaimed but still little seen Happy Hour (2015), feels distinctly independent and off-kilter, made in a world alternative to the festival’s Japanese arthouse staple, Hirokazu Kore-eda, whose new film Shoplifters premiered the same day in the same section and went on to win the Palme d'Or. Kore-eda’s textures of warm colorwork and values of gentle humanism stalwart against sinister social contexts seemed more appropriate to what Cannes desires to...
- 5/24/2018
- MUBI
I have unfortunately not seen any of Ryûsuke Hamaguchi’s earlier work, and am therefore lacking a basis for comparison. Still, after the lavish praise that was heaped upon Hamaguchi’s last feature, Happy Hour, I was left disappointed by Asako I & II, whose portrait of a relationship spanning almost a decade struck me as slight and emotionally inert, all the more so given that it takes amour fou as its focus.
The film, co-written by Hamaguchi and Sachiko Tanaka, is an adaptation of Tomoka Shibasaki’s novel Netemo Sametemo. It starts very promisingly, depicting the first sparks of young love between Asako (Erika Karata) and Baku (Masahiro Higashide) in a tender opening chapter that is over much too soon. Dreamily handsome and with a perpetually stoned demeanor, Baku is an unconventional type whose impulsiveness has Asako instantly smitten. Upon their first encounter, after they catch each other’s eye in the streets of Osaka,...
The film, co-written by Hamaguchi and Sachiko Tanaka, is an adaptation of Tomoka Shibasaki’s novel Netemo Sametemo. It starts very promisingly, depicting the first sparks of young love between Asako (Erika Karata) and Baku (Masahiro Higashide) in a tender opening chapter that is over much too soon. Dreamily handsome and with a perpetually stoned demeanor, Baku is an unconventional type whose impulsiveness has Asako instantly smitten. Upon their first encounter, after they catch each other’s eye in the streets of Osaka,...
- 5/16/2018
- by Giovanni Marchini Camia
- The Film Stage
Ryūsuke Hamaguchi’s earnest romance switches things up by having a woman obsessed with a man’s beauty and then falling for his double
Here is a quibblingly titled movie from Japan that turns out to be an odd doppelganger romance of Ya earnestness, directed and co-written by Ryūsuke Hamaguchi, adapted from the novel by Tomoka Shibasaki. It has a kind of counter-Vertigo theme, a tale of mirror-image obsession, but where this kind of thing is usually about the possessive male gaze and passively enigmatic female beauty, here things are reversed. Asako is about the female gaze, and male beauty.
Erika Karata plays Asako, a college student in Kyoto, demure, hardworking, self-effacing and possessed of a doll-like beauty. One day she attends a photographic exhibition and outside chances across Baku (Masahiro Higashide), a fellow student who is hardly less pretty than she is: cool, careless, like the solo breakout star of a boyband.
Here is a quibblingly titled movie from Japan that turns out to be an odd doppelganger romance of Ya earnestness, directed and co-written by Ryūsuke Hamaguchi, adapted from the novel by Tomoka Shibasaki. It has a kind of counter-Vertigo theme, a tale of mirror-image obsession, but where this kind of thing is usually about the possessive male gaze and passively enigmatic female beauty, here things are reversed. Asako is about the female gaze, and male beauty.
Erika Karata plays Asako, a college student in Kyoto, demure, hardworking, self-effacing and possessed of a doll-like beauty. One day she attends a photographic exhibition and outside chances across Baku (Masahiro Higashide), a fellow student who is hardly less pretty than she is: cool, careless, like the solo breakout star of a boyband.
- 5/15/2018
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
In enigmatic romance “Asako I & II,” the willful heroine can’t choose between two lovers who look exactly the same. Japanese independent director Ryusuke Hamaguchi uses this rather unlikely premise to explore the mysteries of the heart. Catapulted straight to the main competition in Cannes without prior participation at other sections, the helmer’s ninth work boasts a momentous leap in his career. Yet, compared to his previous five-hour epic relationship drama “Happy Hour,” this is less ambitious and lacks the raw honesty or spellbinding intensity of that film.
Adapting a novel of the same title by Tomoka Shibasaki, Hamaguchi extols his source for a compelling representation of love as a mystic experience. However, what gets transferred to the screen becomes more like banal indecision.
When Asako (Erika Karata) encounters her first love Baku Torii (Masahiro Higashide) in her hometown Osaka, it’s staged like a fantasy sequence in...
Adapting a novel of the same title by Tomoka Shibasaki, Hamaguchi extols his source for a compelling representation of love as a mystic experience. However, what gets transferred to the screen becomes more like banal indecision.
When Asako (Erika Karata) encounters her first love Baku Torii (Masahiro Higashide) in her hometown Osaka, it’s staged like a fantasy sequence in...
- 5/15/2018
- by Maggie Lee
- Variety Film + TV
On a day that saw the return of Lars von Trier to the festival that had declared him persona non grata seven years ago, the first screenings of Spike Lee’s incendiary “BlacKkKlansman” and the press unveiling of Hirokazu Kore-eda’s instant Palme d’Or contender “Shoplifters,” it was easy for Hamaguchi Ryusuke’s “Asako I & II” to get lost.
But maybe that’s appropriate, because the gentle, leisurely story that the Japanese director tells deals with a lost love, a lost cat and other things that can disappear if we don’t hold on.
As a director, Hamaguchi has never been in a hurry; his 2015 festival favorite “Happy Hour” in fact stretched on for a full five hours. At just over two hours, “Asako” is less than half that — but it’s a small story, based on Tomoka Shibasaki’s 2010 novel, and the film lingers over ever detail.
But maybe that’s appropriate, because the gentle, leisurely story that the Japanese director tells deals with a lost love, a lost cat and other things that can disappear if we don’t hold on.
As a director, Hamaguchi has never been in a hurry; his 2015 festival favorite “Happy Hour” in fact stretched on for a full five hours. At just over two hours, “Asako” is less than half that — but it’s a small story, based on Tomoka Shibasaki’s 2010 novel, and the film lingers over ever detail.
- 5/14/2018
- by Steve Pond
- The Wrap
Three years ago, Japanese director Ryusuke Hamaguchi scored international plaudits and festival prizes with his five-hour, female-driven ensemble drama Happy Hour. But anyone anticipating similar levels of fine-grained, bittersweet emotional insight from Hamaguchi's Cannes debut will be sorely disappointed. Premiered today in the festival's main competition strand, Asako I & II is a far more conventional film in every way, an oddly old-fashioned depiction of troubled romance whose mildly unusual premise ultimately leads nowhere very interesting. Still, on the plus side, at least it does not drag on for 300 minutes.
Based on a 2010 novel by Tomoka Shibasaki, Asako...
Based on a 2010 novel by Tomoka Shibasaki, Asako...
- 5/14/2018
- by Stephen Dalton
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
It’s the first fiction feature for Gera after her well-received 2013 documentary What’s Love Got To Do With It?.
Paris-based mk2 films has boarded world sales on Indian director Rohena Gera’s star-crossed romance Sir, exploring love across the classes in Mumbai, ahead of the European Film Market this week.
The picture, which was first announced at Goa’s Film Bazaar in 2016, revolves around the impossible relationship between a middle-class man and his maid. It is currently in post-production.
“Sir is a love story that attempts to break through the class barriers in India, but it’s definitely not a straightforward Cinderella story, the ending is quite the opposite to what we might suspect as is the discovery that even the most privileged individuals are victims of the class divide,” said mk2 films managing director Juliette Schrameck.
Schrameck notes that it joins a number of other new titles either by female directors or looking at the status...
Paris-based mk2 films has boarded world sales on Indian director Rohena Gera’s star-crossed romance Sir, exploring love across the classes in Mumbai, ahead of the European Film Market this week.
The picture, which was first announced at Goa’s Film Bazaar in 2016, revolves around the impossible relationship between a middle-class man and his maid. It is currently in post-production.
“Sir is a love story that attempts to break through the class barriers in India, but it’s definitely not a straightforward Cinderella story, the ending is quite the opposite to what we might suspect as is the discovery that even the most privileged individuals are victims of the class divide,” said mk2 films managing director Juliette Schrameck.
Schrameck notes that it joins a number of other new titles either by female directors or looking at the status...
- 2/12/2018
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- ScreenDaily
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