Somai shoots this artful Nikkatsu Roman Porno effort with trademark long takes, fusing eroticism with a sense of fate and lingering despair in the sexual encounters between a suicidal man and a woman prostituting herself for the first time.
Somai captures both the energy and inquisitiveness of youth, and the resignation of the aged, as three boys’ encounter with a lonely old man brings about changed perspectives toward life and death.
Somai’s tender and transformative masterwork, about a child grappling with her parents’ divorce, boasts an extraordinary acting debut by Tomoko Tabata, capturing the emotional, physical and psychological aspects of separation with such empathy.
Eternality Tan 