An unstable young woman pines for the old boyfriend who nearly beat her to death, in director Kazuya Shiraishi’s gripping tale of eros, deprivation, and desire.
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This cinematic adaptation of Mahokaru Numata's novel features a powerful performance by Japanese star Yu Aoi, in the role of an unstable and depressed young woman. Ultimately a film about the extremes unrequited love can push people to, Birds Without Names is a unique work that defies genre definitions. Oscillating from thriller to melodrama, the film echoes Brian De Palma and Park Chan-wook with its vivid depiction of immoral actions and emotional turbulence.
Towako (Yu Aoi) lives with Jinji (Sadawo Abe), a man 15 years her senior. She doesn't love him but lets him take care of her. Jinji is a simple man, a blue-collar worker who supports Towako financially, cooks her food, and even provides for her sexual pleasure. But Towako cannot forget her ex-boyfriend Kurosaki (Yutaka Takenouchi). The love, the excitement, the good times with Kurosaki keep replaying in her mind and nothing and no one seem capable of filling her emptiness — not even the steamy affair she has with Mizushima (Tori Matsuzaka). One day a policeman arrives at her door, an ominous harbinger of sinister news: Kurosaki has been missing for eight years, ever since the day he nearly beat her to death.
Gripping storytelling matches the beautiful, yet grim, mise en scène. A tale of eros, deprivation, and desire told with desperate intensity, Kazuya Shiraishi's latest film takes the audience inside a dark labyrinth of criminal passions.
GIOVANNA FULVI