Review of Ichiko (2023)

Moving picture, 126 minutes

Seen in 2024.

When Hasegawa asks Ichiko to marry him, she is deeply touched and accepts his proposal. The day after, Hasegawa comes home to find their apartment empty, with Ichiko’s bug-out bag left on the balcony in a hurry. He goes looking for her.

A fruitful combination of the twisting, out-of-sequence teen mystery of All About Lily Chou-Chou (2001) with the laconic sobriety of Hana-bi (1997) and the poverty and social consciousness of Shoplifters (2018).

moving picture Japanese production fiction