Ryu is a solitary girl whose fragile appearance is in stark contrast with the double life she leads, working nights at a Tokyo fishmarket and sporadically taking on jobs as a hit-woman.
Mr Nagara is a powerful impresario mourning the loss of his daughter Midori, who has committed suicide. He blames David, a Spaniard who runs a wine business in Tokyo.
Mr Nagara’s employee, Ishida, was silently in love with Midori and hires Ryu to murder David.
A sound engineer, obsessed with the sounds of the Japanese city and fascinated with Ryu, witnesses this love story which searches the shadows of the human soul, reaching deep into places where only silence has the power of eloquence. —Cannes Film Festival
Born 9 April, 1960 in Sant Adrià de Besòs (Barcelona, Spain) is a Spanish film director. She received a History M.A. at University of Barcelona and has worked as a journalist and director for several television advertisements. In 2000 she created Miss Wasabi Films, a production company in charge of the development of several documentaries. Creative director of JWT, founder and creative director of the agency Target and the production company Eddie Saeta, she has done several ads for the brands: British Telecommunications, Ford, Danone, BMW, Ikea, Evax, Renault, Peugeot, Winston, Kronenbourg, Pepsi, Kellogg, MCI, Helene Curtis, Procter Gamble, Philip Morris and the Fundación Once, amongst others. She is a public supporter of the Spanish Socialist Worker’s Party and made several advertisements for television during the 2008 Elections. Member of the jury at the Berlin Film Festival in 2009, Coixet, along with Bigas Luna, are selected to be in charge of the exhibit at the Spanish World… read more
Beautiful cinematography, great sexual chemistry between Rinko Kikuchi and Sergi López... I found it interesting how Coixet really took a gamble on making the sex scenes noticeably long and graphic almost a la 'Last Tango in Paris'... The composition is stunningly though really... beyond that, the film falls a bit short in its character establishment, narrative development, etc. ... still worth a gander though...
The movie is set in Tokyo, but contrary to “Lost in translation” here the movie tries to build half on Japanese characters and half on western ones, which really demands a deeper knowledge about Japan… read review
