Emerging as one of the most accomplished Japanese directors of the last decade, Harmonium and A Girl Missing director Kōji Fukada is back with his next feature. Love Life, which premiered at Venice Film Festival last fall, follows a couple living with their young son, when a tragic accident brings the boy’s long-lost father back into their life. Ahead of an August 11 release beginning at IFC Center, the first U.S. trailer has now arrived from Oscilloscope Laboratories.
Rory O’Connor said in his Venice review, “Love Life is one of those films that really wears its screenplay. The plot follows a mother’s attempts to come to terms with the death of a child, but it’s more about unusual paths the journey takes for her to get there. The director is Kôji Fukada, a filmmaker who studied under Kiyoshi Kurosawa and cites Rohmer as a key influence. The first of Fukada’s films to complete for one of the grand festival awards, it premiered this week in what has been if not the best, then at least the glitziest Venice lineup in recent memory. Amongst the stars, Love Life (named for an Akiko Yano song of the same name) is jarringly everyday in color palette and setting, but has just the right amount of scope, filmmaking nous, and unusual choices to hold its own and even stand out.”
See the trailer below.
Love Life opens on August 11.