The Light of Spring
Press Play to start
European premiereTheatrical Screenings
Online Availability
Additional Materials
Film description
Special mention in the New Cinema of Asia competition of the 16th AFF Five Flavors, awarded by the International People's Jury.
The beginning is inconspicuous. In a tiny suburban Tokyo apartment, the Hirabuki family, a couple with two children, is getting ready for a trip. The question, “Where are we going?” is met with silence. The camera does not follow them on their joint trip, it observes each person individually. When the son returns from a visit to a museum with his father, his mother and sister are not home. The child doesn’t recognize the signs heralding the parents’ separation. This is how Fumito Fujikawa begins his docudrama, bringing the camera into the life of a family he knows personally.
Dangerously balancing between fiction and document, Fujikawa looks at the dynamics of family feuds, but does not gravitate towards a sensational record of the Harabukis’ existence. The eye of his camera captures involuntary looks, gestures, the rhythm of their daily life, and reflections in the mirrors, in which the unspoken words are lost. The reality feel is strengthened by the classic 4:3 format of the image, in which Fujikawa creates a space for a family chronicle, woven in the likeness of a Neorealist home video, suspended in a contemplative awaiting for the light of spring.
text:
Łukasz Mańkowski
Fumito Fujikawa
Japanese documentary filmmaker, born in 1985 in Hiroshima. Apart from film school, he also studied anthropology. In his documentary films, he observes local societies and the changing spaces they inhabit. He likes to combine fiction with documentaries. In 2020, he made a documentary film about Arequipa in Peru, where he lived for a while. The Light of Spring, screened at the festival in Osaka, is his third full-length feature.
2015 Isanatori / The Name of the Whale
2020 Supa Layme
2022 Wiosenny pobrzask / Hikari Nodokeki / The Light of Spring
