Almost always when seeing oriental movies, I find myself in front of the cultural abyss that separates us. I see the characters almost as if they were from another dimension, making strange gestures, eating strange things and saying strange things. This film is no exception. But in that very strangeness, the director manages to tell a daily and customary story as simple and direct as the title of the film. That is what the film is, no more and no less: a family in Tokyo. Although at the beginning it becomes very heavy, then picks up a lot and I could enjoy a mundane story and nothing flashy but somehow therein lies its value as a movie. In the normality, the wonder of family relationships appears. And in this case, we can be dragged to the parallel universe of life and Japanese culture, in which we find extremely different but also tremendously universal things. I think the movie does not "pass", but worth it for the "Japan-curious". The screenplay delivers an everyday, simple story. The are A LOT of actors, but a special mention for Yoshiyuki (the grandmother) and Yu Aoi (Noriko, the girlfriend of Shuji).
Review of Tokyo Family
