Hanagatami

In 2017 veteran filmmaker Nobuhiko Obayashi (Casting Blossoms to the Sky, House) learned he had stage four cancer. His response was to fulfill a 40-year old filmmaking dream in the time he had remaining.

In spring 1941, Toshihiko returns from Europe, showing up at the home of his aunt in Karatsu, Saga Prefecture.  He entertains a crush on his tubercular cousin Mina while reveling in “depraved” adolescence with the girls and indulging in bravery-testing escapades with his school buddies. The pacific war soon erupts and their fragile, idyllic world is torn asunder.

Based on Kazuo Dan’s novella, this luminous, dream-like film delivers a timeless story of the pureness of youth beset by the terrible chaos of war.