Awards and festivals

Film description

An introvert teacher, Nanami, publishes her diary online under a pseudonym. One of the things she describes are her wedding preparations. She doesn’t have many friends, so under the pressure from the groom’s family she secretly hires a charming stranger and his team to play the bride’s relatives. At first, everything is going smoothly, but the new people in her life will lead Nanami to places she never knew existed.

Iwai, known for his ability to combine melancholic poetics with manga-style expressiveness, leads his protagonist through the urban wonderland, where appearances are deceptive, and other travelers are not who they seem to be. Nanami is not unlike Bulgakov’s Margarita, even though on her way she meets not a Master, but a Mistress. The woman will have to face her many fears, and the director’s imagination will set the bar pretty high. An epic, layered, extravagantly told story about loneliness and independence, completed with a lyrical soundtrack and atmospheric cinematography.

Jagoda Murczyńska