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Upcoming from MoC (TBC), and presumably will be a Blu-ray debut for director Naomi Kawase.

Nice. I've heard of her through the late and much-lamented Midnight Eye blog by Tom Mes and Jasper Sharp. Maybe they'll do a commentary...?

Should've gone with Shara instead. That would've been one of the most exciting releases of the year.

I haven't seen this one yet, but I can't say that that it looks very promising.

beamish13 wrote:Nice. I've heard of her through the late and much-lamented Midnight Eye blog by Tom Mes and Jasper Sharp. Maybe they'll do a commentary...?

Sharp and Mes championed her documentaries and early features, but aren't so hot on what came after. Mes has been very critical of her post-Hotaru features (the linked review is from 2009, but I doubt something like Hanezu would've fared much better at his hands), and Sharp broadly echoed those sentiments in his brutal pan of Still the Water for Sight & Sound. But An was apparently a conscious attempt to reach beyond the festival crowd, so maybe the problems they have with her other recent-ish features aren't so pronounced here.

August 22, according to Amazon.

Finally got the BD of this. I felt a bit of trepidation -- but as it turned out, I needn't have feared. This is possibly Kawase's most accessible -- and sweet-natured -- film ever. Visually lovely (as one expected), but with a very good script and some superb performances by some of Japan's best professionals. Masatoshi Nagase was wonderful -- and Kirin Kiki (one of my very favorite living actresses) gave one of her best (and most low-key) performances. The MOC release looked great -- and the interview with Kawase was decent (but not especially revelatory).