Tengoku no honya - koibi (2004) User Reviews

Reincarnating love

[ushiros · 7/10 · 29 September 2004]

Kenta (TAMAYAMA Tetsuji), a just fired pianist, finds himself at a bookstore in Heaven after he was dead drunk out of desperation in a tavern last night.

He's not dead. The bookstore has hired him for a short-term job, and he can go back to the earth after the working period. Most of the other habitants in Heaven have already ended their life on the earth and are preparing for their next life back on the earth. Since every human being has a life of just one hundred years, they live in Heaven for the rest of their life after they die on the earth. If you are dead at seventy, you live for thirty years in Heaven and start a new life on the earth as completely another person -- you have no memory about the previous life. If you live on the earth for a hundred years or more, you immediately reincarnate without going to Heaven.

Soon, Kenta knows Heaven is not like he imagined before and not much different from the earth. It has towns, streets, stores, parks, vehicles, and anything which exists on the earth. He meets a beautiful woman named Sho^ko (TAKEUCHI Yu^ko). She has a grand piano in her cottage and that reminds him that he met her on the earth when he was a boy. She was a gifted pianist and inspired him to make himself a pianist. She tells him she has not played the piano since she lost her one ear's hearing by an accident and has occasional pains in the ear.

At the same time on the earth, Sho^ko's niece, Kanako (Takeuchi, in a double role) is making efforts to restore the town's annual summer fireworks display after more than ten years' interruption. She and her pals especially want to revive its highlight program, "The Loving Fireworks". It is said couples will unite forever if they watch the firework. But Kanako and her pals face a big problem. There is the only man who can make the firework and he quit the job more than ten years ago. She finds and meets the fireworks maker but he tells her he has no intention to make "The Loving Fireworks" or any other fireworks. She gets to know the reason. When he invited his girlfriend to his workshop, he caused an accidental explosion and it robbed her of the one ear's hearing and her music life as a pianist.

This film has two stories in Heaven and on the earth which go on at the same time. When and how will the two meet? And What will happen when they meet?

(7 out of 10)

• USHIRO Satoshi

Pretty setting, serious themes, half-baked treatment

[papagenopip · 5/10 · 20 May 2006]

Unless you're addicted to prettily-shot romantic fluff with cute but skin-deep ideas (like bookshops in Heaven), the only reason to see this slow-moving, emotionally unfocused movie is the performances of Takeuchi Yuko and Kagawa Teruyuki. Takeuchi manages to give some appeal and depth to the two underwritten characters she plays. And Kagawa gives such a raw and discomfiting performance as a former fire-works maker in need of redemption that he seems out of place in a movie which otherwise prettifies pain.

As a whole, the movie fails to strike a balance between the cuteness of its set-up, and the seriousness of its themes of love and guilt, which it lingers over mournfully. It's neither light enough nor serious enough. And as we're expected to invest emotionally in so many characters, all of whom are underdeveloped, we end up investing in none of them.

The last scene is a beauty though.

Eternity is just a song

[grandmastersik · 8/10 · 20 August 2007]

The Heaven is this film is a place where those who died before the age of 100 go to "live out" the rest of their time; if they lived over 100 on Earth, then they're automatically reincarnated, otherwise, they wait it out.

In Heaven there truly are no dogs, there are also no handicapped, despite the fact that those who die go to Heaven with the appearance they held at the time of their death.

But this is just me nit-picking.

The story here is all about human development and healing - a fine story then, if we only get 100 years to find true inner-peace and happiness before our slates are wiped clean and we're born again.

Forget religious propaganda - lots of different beliefs are borrowed from to create the "Heaven" in this film. Try to forget also the half-witted acting of Natsuko's step-brother, whom I'm still at odds about as to whether he was supposed to be retarded or was truly just that bad.

Forget everything and just watch with an open mind and slowly - it may take an uneasy first 50 minutes, but - slowly, your heart will open as well.

I could drone on about metaphors of love and fireworks, of heart-break and piano symphonies, as I could also reveal more of the plot... but I won't.

I walked into this one knowing precious little and it was the best way: let the tale move you as it unfolds.

If our souls are cleansed of all memories before we are reborn then love cannot ever be eternal; it can, however, be the most important aspect of our lives.

A moving, enjoyable and up-lifting film which is marred by a slightly dull first 45 minutes and a bit of bad acting and dialogue. All of which is meaningless come that final shot as you realise that even though you may have used a whole packet of tissues, life is to be lived.

Beautiful fairy-tale

[kevin142 · 8/10 · 3 August 2005]

People would not die. There was a 100-year-rule in the film. That meant if you died at 70, you still could live another 30 years in heaven. However the pianist Kenta was an exception. The heaven really was a peaceful place. Even you could meet the people you love if you were lucky. Finally Kenta not only made a good melody but also learned the meaning of love.

There were two stories in the film. One happened in heaven, another one on earth. I prefer to the previous one. When you lose something, you will find its real value. That is also for people. So when you are alive, do not be hesitating to show your love to people you love. Thing always is changeable. We do not know what will happen tomorrow.

In the ending part, the piano music and firework brought me huge pleasure. That was the most magnificent scene in the movie. Watching the scene, I feel that I am so lucky to live in the world. Good movie just likes good book, you will get more from it.

As to acting, my favorite actress Yuko Takeuchi surpassed her another two works (Yomigaeri, Engligh title is Resurrection, another one is Yima aini yukimasu, English title is Be with you). She played two different roles in the movie. To my joy, she succeeded.

One of the best romantic movies. 9/10

Innovative story; great acting; splendorous photography; wonderful music

[harry_tk_yung · 28 April 2005]

We should first get the fundamental perimeters straight. The basic order of things here is reincarnation, but reincarnation with a twist. The catch is the magic number 100, the MINIMUM number of years every single individual is allowed to enjoy before reincarnation. So what if you die on earth before you live to be 100? You go to "heaven" as a transitional stop where you live out the remainder of your life. Forget all you conventional understanding of heaven. This "heaven" in the movie is merely another version of earth, where you continue living until 100. In this particular instance, it's a quaint little Japanese town that looks like one of those heritage sites in a theme park.

You can see the possibilities the scriptwriter can have with this world order. But, to further complicate things, there's one more way you can go to heaven other than dying. You can simply be brought to heaven, by those in charge over there, for a temporary sojourning, and then sent back to earth (while those who come as a result of dying can't go back). "Heaven's Bookstore" is about such a situation, and not about reincarnation.

The movie starts with young pianist Kenta (Tetsuji Tamayama) who, after a disastrous performance of Schubert's Trout Quintet, gets fired, gets drunk and wakes up to find himself in heaven, assigned to a temporary job in Heaven's Bookstore reading books to people at their request. No further elaboration of the plot will be necessary here. Although there are two stories running parallel in Heaven and earth, they are fairly simple and straightforward, with no suspenseful twists. The inter-relationship between the two stories is explained very clearly early in the movie.

Heaven's Bookstore is refreshingly different from your usual romances. In addition to love, it is about forgiveness. It's about reconciling with oneself after making mistakes that look irreparable. It's about absolution. It's also about rekindling the fire of artistic creation in the face of despair. But in the end, it's also about love. The movie is built on the ultimate focus towards two pinnacles of artistic creation, a beautiful piece of piano music called "Eternity" and a splendorous piece of firework called "Wabi" (firework of love).

Yuko Takeuchi, who has won every heart in the cinemas showing "Be with you", surpasses her performance there by playing two roles in "Heaven's Bookstore". While examples of such attempts are abundant, two immediately come to mind: excellent Lindsay Lohan in The Parent Trap (1998) (she's even better than Hayley Mills in the original 1961 version) and mediocre Son Ye-jin in Keulraesik (2003). Yuko Takeuchi's interpretation of the two very different characters she plays does not suffer in comparison to any of the best examples we've seen.

CONCLUDING SPOILER: One interesting thing about Heaven's Bookstore is that although there are at least three love stories in the movie, we don't get to actually SEE any. Of the three, one is in the past, another one in the future and the third (this one with the supporting cast) is unfulfilled.