Kamera o tomeru na!

Luke says:

No Spoilers! This is a very easy to spoil movie so I’m only really gonna write about context. This movie was essentially a student film. It was the product of an acting and directing seminar final, based out of Tokyo, with most of the cast and crew paying to work on the movie. It was made on a reported $25,000 budget which was partially crowdfunded. It originally only got a six day run at a small theatre in Tokyo, it was then invited to the Udine Far East Film Festival in Udine, Italy where it became a major success. From there, it gained wider exposure and was re-released in Japan. It earned a worldwide box office gross of 30 million dollars! Basically, This is a student film, on a micro budget, that through it’s sheer excellence of craft became a worldwide success.

It continues to grow in popularity being shown on The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs via Shudder most recently. That’s how I originally saw it and I highly recommend you watch the episode of the show. Lot’s of great insight into the film and a passionate Joe Bob speech at the end of the show about the merit of making art despite a lack of resources or conventional wisdom that had me tearing up.  

This movie is extremely clever and fun as fuck. We’ll just have to leave it at that. Luke Bob Bergkoetter says, “Check it out.”