MOVING

Since its premiere in 1993, MOVING has been one of filmmaker Shinji Somai’s most beloved films in his native Japan. Now it’s been newly restored and is here to blow you away. In this beautiful family drama, Somai transcends the tropes of stories of children dealing with divorce to bring us a film filled with indelible images about an unforgettable teenage girl who encounters the unknown and refuses to succumb to it. Desperately trying to keep her family together, Ren (Tomoko Tabata) yearns for stability and happiness while lashing out at both home and school as her daily life becomes a bid to reclaim some type of agency.

What Somai crafts is nothing short of miraculous: a child’s unanswered cries and silent mourning at her family’s dissolution, attempting to cling onto a life of what was. A sweeping odyssey of self-discovery, Somai’s heartbreaking elegy to childhood finds young Ren having to grow up in the face of it all, culminating in a surreal matsuri drenched in billowing flame and fantasy.

“MOVING marks a period of the highest refinement in Shinji Somai’s career.” — Ryusuke Hamaguchi

“After seeing MOVING, I had confirmation that Shinji Somai was the best filmmaker of his generation, which immediately placed him as the only director I was hoping to overtake.” — Hirokazu Kore-Eda