ryuganji: film news from japan

Just came to the end of a particularly busy period of work and festival-going, so in lieu of a forthcoming FILMex wrap-up here’s some straightforward news that Tokyograph haven’t beaten me to yet:

Restless Fuji TV hitmaker Kameyama Chihiro and his “Bayside Shakedown” scriptwriter Kimizuka Ryoichi (picture left) are re-teaming to make another police movie called “Dare mo Mamotte kurenai” (something like “No-one Will Protect Me”), this time directed by the latter and starring stern bastard specialist Sato Koichi (picture right) and wee Shida Mirai (picture centre), who’s best known for playing a pregnant 14-year-old in a creepy TV series last year.

Kimizuka previously directed the Bayside spin-off “The Suspect: Muroi Shinji” (as well as the supernatural drama “Makoto”), but as the casting of Sato suggests, this new cop drama leaves behind the popcorn-fodder approach of that series for heavier socially-conscious subject matter.

The older brother of junior high school student Saori (Shida) is arrested for murder. In order to protect her family from public reprisal, the police make them change their family name to the mother’s. The father is forced to take a leave of absence from his company and Saori is taken out of school in order to cut off all contact with society. To further avoid the attention of the media, the family is separated and Saori is sent to stay with East Shinjuku police detective Katsuura (Sato). The shock of the murder has caused Saori to withdraw within herself, and Katsuura must balance his duty to protect her with his need to draw testimony from her determining her brother’s guilt. However, Katsuura’s family is also on the brink of collapse, and his daughter, who is the same age as Saori and is desperately trying to hold her own family together, understands her pain all too well…

Yanagiba Toshiro (Muroi Shinji himself), Ishida Yuriko and Sasaki Kuranosuke also feature, and a release is set for next autumn in Japan. (source: Sanspo)