Only in Japan

Rating: 7/10 (27 March 2009)

Very nice film - good tear jerker as it takes audience on emotional roller-coaster.
Motoki gives believable performance and is quite convincing as a cellist. Although the scenes with him playing the cello in wildflowers with ice capped mountains in the background look so much like a Visa advertisement it was a bit too chocolate box. Also the end scene where he is crying over his father could have been a good 10 minutes shorter as the audience is so exhausted by then that there isn't enough energy to sustain them through that overly long emotional scene.
Hirosue's performance is as calming as hearing fingernails screeching down a blackboard for an hour. The horrible fake laughter and false cheer, accompanied by the girlish behaviour are really irritating. She ruined what should have been a dignified role as the long suffering ever respectable Japanese wife. If the film could be shot again without Hirosue I am sure the audience would feel a lot more empathy for the character and the movie would have a greater dimension.
It is charming to see the quite elaborate manners of the Japanese so nicely displayed, and it is this theme about showing respect for both the living and the dead which makes this a quintessentially Jpanaese movie.
Recommended!