Kôji Fukada’s ‘Love Life’ UK release date
2 min read
In his new feature LOVE LIFE, Japanese writer/director Kôji Fukada delivers a beguiling, beautifully paced portrait of a family navigating the aftermath of a tragedy, with honesty and a sense of hope.
LOVE LIFE had its world premiere in competition for Best Film at the 2022 Venice Film Festival, which has been followed by international film festival presentations including TIFF and the BFI London Film Festival in 2022. On 15 September 2023 BFI Distribution will bring it to cinemas in the UK and Ireland. At BFI Southbank, it will play on extended run along with three previous Fukada films, HOSPITALITÉ (2010), AU REVOIR L’ÉTÉ (2013) and HARMONIUM (2016). The films are programmed alongside a major Yasujirō Ozu season running 1 September – 3 October; the two directors share a deep interest in the human experience. LOVE LIFE will be streaming on BFI Player Subscription and available on Amazon Prime and iTunes from 3 November.
Inspired by Japanese singer and musician Akiko Yano’s song “Love Life”, the film tells the story of Taeko (Fumino Kimura) and her husband Jiro (Kento Nagayama) who are living a peaceful existence with her young son Keita (Tetta Shimada), when a tragic accident brings the boy’s long-lost father, Park (Atom Sunada), back into Taeko’s life. To cope with the pain and guilt she feels after the accident, Taeko throws herself into helping this deaf and homeless man for whom she feels a strong sense of responsibility. Kôji Fukada powerfully uses sign language in the film and has said of this choice that ‘I don’t have to come up with reasons to have hearing people in my films, so it would be unfair to ask for a reason to have a deaf person. Hopefully, this film will be a step towards this becoming the norm, where we don’t demand a special reason to have deaf people in films. That would be a great innovation to come out of this.’
Fukada, born in 1980 in Tokyo, is best known for AU REVOIR L’ÉTÉ (Goodbye Summer) which he made in 2013 and HARMONIUM, which won the Jury Award in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes 2016. He was awarded Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France in 2018. As well as filmmaking, he is an activist, campaigning for better opportunities for young directors in Japan and the creation of an organisation like the CNC in France (National Centre for Cinema and the Moving Image) to support them.
